
Book rHf C^ 

Copyright N? 



copyRicHT DEPOsrr. 



SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY 
IN THE ORIENT 



■s 9 ^^^ o ■« 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO 
DALLAS • ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOLTRNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OP CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 




JOHN E. CLOUGH (1891) 

"/ arrived in Boston. . . . The papers talked of me as a venerable 
old man, yet I zvas only fifty-five years of age, grown prematurely old through 
the burdens I had carried. . . . The house was packed. . . . I told 
them in simple words how the Telugu Mission had grown. . , . They granted 
everything for which I asked. . . . One year later twenty-five men were 
ready to go. . . . Fifty thousand dollars were given twice over. . . . 
Jesus was bringing the uttermost parts of the earth together in spiritual con- 
tact. ..." 



SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY 
IN THE ORIENT 

THE STORY OF A MAN, A MISSION 
AND A MOVEMENT 

BY 

JOHN E. CLQUGH, d.d. 



WRITTEN DOWN FOR HIM BY HIS WIFE 

EMMA RAUSCHENBUSCH CLOUGH, Ph.D. 

Member of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 
Mitglied der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft 



ifietti |?orfe 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1914 



■^-^ 



i%^° 

C& 



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Copyright, 1914 
By the MACMILLAN COMPANY 



Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1914 



OCT -8 1914 




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'CI,A379920 



INTRODUCTION 

This is one of the great stories of modern missions. 
Numerous short versions of it have for years been 
circulated. It is here told for the first time in full. 

During three decades unusual tidings reached the 
Christian world from the little Telugu town of Ongole, 
in southern India. These tidings dealt with events 
of a religious nature in so dramatic a form that they 
appealed to the imagination as well as to the faith of 
men. They were full of the romance of missions : there 
was prophecy fulfilled, inspiration voiced in song, and 
there was manifestation of a simple faith in Jesus, the 
Christ, by such numbers that it approached the miracu- 
lous. In an out-of-the-way place of the world striking 
phenomena of a spiritual nature occurred, which most 
of the followers of Jesus had begun to believe im- 
possible. 

The facts were simple, and distinctly human, never- 
theless most unusual. The mass baptism of nearly nine 
thousand persons in six weeks received its appealingly 
picturesque setting in a huge famine camp, where the 
starving were brought together. Yet not the pangs of 
hunger, nor the hope of help could wholly explain how 
the religious impulse could move thousands to awaken out 
of the apathy of their ignorant, downtrodden lives, and 
walk long distances to give expression to the newly- 
born faith within them, and to demand the Christian 
rite of baptism. 

It all sounded strangely like the early centuries of 
the Christian era. Men marveled at it, and felt their 



VI INTRODUCTION 

faith refreshed. They pointed to that mass movement 
in the far-off Telugu country when they looked for tests 
on which to stake their trust in the power of the Christ 
to touch the hearts of men in large numbers even to-day. 

The story was repeated hundreds of times the world 
over. Among all the links that were then being forged 
to bind the West to the East, in the beginnings of the 
racial contact which is now assuming such vast propor- 
tions, that story played a part. It forced a host of Chris- 
tians who seldom thought beyond their own country 
and their own race to ask. Who are those people whose 
faith in our Master, Jesus, is so simple and so strong? 
They thus took the first step in the direction of that 
larger sense of brotherhood which enfolds all races. 

At the time when this story begins, in the middle 
of the last century, India was not yet awake as she is 
to-day. That interchange of thought had only just be- 
gun, between East and West, which led the thinkers of 
the West to the fountain of the ancient wisdom of India, 
and gave in turn to the Hindu some access to the men- 
tal striving which marks the Anglo-Saxon race. Eng- 
land had but just become the reigning political power. 
Religious liberty had been proclaimed, but had yet to 
be taught to intolerant village officials. The caste sys- 
tem as an arrangement of the social order had become 
a species of tyranny to hold the people down. At the 
bottom round of the social ladder, in a position almost of 
serfdom, were the tribes of Pariahs. The ancient com- 
munal village system, though even then beginning to 
disintegrate under English rule, was still intact and 
pressed the Pariahs sorely. It came to pass that among 
one of these outcaste tribes there was a mass movement 
toward Christianity. Of that movement this is the 
story. 



INTRODUCTION Vll 

When John E. Clough went to India in 1864, the 
project of foreign missions was in its early vigorous 
youth. There was opportunity for heroism. It was a 
time of the free reaching out of missionary pioneers, 
scattered here and there, the propaganda spirit strong 
upon them, their methods yet in the making, and their 
problems slowly taking shape. Some of them developed 
into men of striking personality — into men who were a 
pronounced embodiment of the white man's way of 
taking life and its resources. By their dwelling among 
them, these men made available to Asiatics to some ex- 
tent the heritage of Western thought and motive. 

Like their great Master, these early missionaries had 
the tendency to address themselves to the poor and lowly. 
Though seldom received by the higher classes of the 
Indian population, they found that the outcaste tribes 
received them gladly. They took upon themselves the 
burdens of the heavy laden, and as time passed identified 
themselves more and more with the interests of the 
Pariah classes. Ready to second the efforts of enlight- 
ened English government officials, they labored for the 
uplifting of the submerged tenth of the population. 

To-day the Hindus realize that they missed an im- 
portant opportunity while they held aloof from the 
Pariahs, and allowed them to reach out after better 
social conditions under the tutelage of the foreign 
religion. They have reason to fear that the organic con- 
nection between high and low has thereby been weak- 
ened, and they are now beginning to cope with the 
problem on lines distinctly oriental. This marks a phase 
of the onward tread of a nation. But the fact remains 
that here the missionaries were the pathfinders. And 
Dr. Clough stands out among his fellow pioneers in 
the front rank, second to none. In so far as he became 
the leader of several hundred thousand Pariahs in a 



Viii INTRODUCTION 

movement toward adequate recognition in the social or- 
ganism, he took part in the reconstruction of modern 
India on lines indicated by the progressive Christian 
nations of the West. 

A peculiar condition of preparedness was waiting for 
the contact with him. The man seldom creates the sit- 
uation; the two must find each other. In this case a 
nucleus of spiritual force of a distinctly oriental type 
had been engendered, with which he came in touch soon 
after his arrival in Ongole, and the birth of that mass 
movement toward Christianity took place then and there. 
A close relation existed between several preceding 
Hindu religious movements and the Christian movement 
which spread over the same area. Indian religious re- 
formers had prepared the way. Through them most 
of the men and women who became leaders in the Chris- 
tian movement had come under Yoga teaching. The 
Christian propaganda inherited the religious fervor fos- 
tered in Indian mysticism. 

In more ways than he realized. Dr. Clough worked 
on the lines of primitive Christianity. Like the Chris- 
tians of apostolic times, he and his staff of preachers 
simply told and retold the story of the life and death 
of Jesus, the Christ, with a tireless zeal, and around the 
personality of Jesus as a living, loving reality men gath- 
ered in thousands. Dr. Clough had a singular conviction 
that he was acting as his ambassador. He was often 
spoken of as the "Apostle to the Telugus." In so far as 
the movement was a revival of primitive Christianity it 
was successful. 

From the beginning of his career, Dr Clough's 
strength lay in the fact that he so thoroughly wrought 
out his own methods. He had the typical American 
capacity of seeing a need clearly and meeting it promptly. 
There was a boldness in his methods that led him to 



INTRODUCTION IX 

hew a fresh track off the beaten highroad. Other men, 
consciously or unconsciously, followed him. Students of 
missions believe that he inaugurated a new era in modern 
foreign missions. There were controversies over his 
methods all through the years, yet he and his mission 
stood unmoved. He felt the pressure of destiny which 
used him as a part in some great design, and often he 
forged ahead fearlessly when he scarcely knew where 
the path was leading him. 

The old missionary aim had been to seek the conver- 
sion of individuals; to get them detached from their 
previous life, one by one, and gathered into churches. 
Dr. Clough did not discard this aim; he added to it 
his faculty of getting hold of men. Early in his career 
he recognized the importance of the social group; he 
left men in it and Christianized the group. Family 
cohesion and tribal characteristics were factors with 
which he reckoned. And when, with the gregarious in- 
stincts that dominate an eastern tribe, they came over 
to Christianity in families, in villages, in crowds, he 
was not afraid of them; he had become an expert on 
their social organization, and could handle the crisis. 

It had been a method much used by the older mis- 
sionaries, to go to annual temple festivals, and to use 
occasions of religious excitement to bring to the minds 
of the gathered crowds the teachings of the new re- 
ligion. This he discarded wholly. He preferred to take 
men in their own home environment, not as detached 
units away from home. From the first he went straight 
into Indian village life and planted centers of Christian 
activity there that grew and flourished with evident life. 

He believed in a large use of native agency in evan- 
gelization. In a masterly fashion he picked out the men 
who rose above the rest and drew out the best that 
was in them. He let his preachers stay as close to the 



X INTRODUCTION 

model of the Hindu Guru — the spiritual teacher whom 
they had known in the old regime — as was possible. 
Always ready to heed the opinions of his staff of work- 
ers, they taught him to see with their eyes. On the 
basis of the primitive system of self-government exist- 
ing in the Indian village, he built up a rudimentary 
church government. Leaving the people in their own 
grooves, respecting their old customs wherever principle 
was not at stake, he inspired the social organization with 
the Christian spirit. Therein lay the cause for the 
stability of the movement : the foundations were oriental 
and therefore permanent. 

That mass movement toward Christianity in the 
Orient has already receded sufficiently far into the past 
to permit a historical estimate of its value. The thou- 
sands who participated in it have mostly passed away; 
they lived in the faith and died in it. There has not 
been a single break in the continuity. The Telugu Mis- 
sion of the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society 
has a staff of more than one hundred missionaries, sixty 
thousand communicant members, two hundred thousand 
adherents, and schools by the hundred. The "whole- 
sale baptisms" of thirty years ago were not followed 
by wholesale apostasy. There was no lamentable dimin- 
ishing of religious fervor. As Dr. Clough used to say, 
"Jesus kept them all faithful to the end." It therefore 
appears that this movement toward Christianity within 
a primitive outcaste Asiatic tribe will have to be marked 
in the history of missions as a success, and will have 
to go down in church history as such. 

It remains for me to state the manner in which my 
husband and I cooperated in producing this book. The 
story is his; the writing is mine. When we began this 
book in the summer of 1908, he was already past writing 
anything himself, and he was almost past dictating. 



INTRODUCTION XI 

His memory for facts and dates was nearly gone, but 
that was unessential: I had gathered the facts. 

My material was abundant. There were his diaries 
for forty years, printed reports and newspaper cuttings 
for all those years, and many packages of old letters. 
He had dictated to me, ten years before, much pertain- 
ing to his early life, previous to going to India. All 
the old stories which I used to hear him tell in the 
course of years, if not in my notebook, were stored in 
my memory. I put them all into the book, nor did I let 
them lose that slight touch of boast fulness that generally 
characterizes a masterful man's reminiscences. 

I had drawn upon other sources also. I knew person- 
ally nearly all the men and women mentioned in this 
story, and with many of them I had had long talks, 
all with a view to obtaining the information which I 
knew would be needed for this book. My notebook 
was full of the stories which the old preachers of the 
mission told me. I went over many of them with my 
husband; and he asked me to put them all in. He had 
a great love for those men, his faithful staff of workers 
through all the years, and wanted their stories to form 
a part of his own. 

It often encouraged us both to find how old friends 
were willing to take hold and help, so that there might 
be neither errors nor lack of information. It is for me 
now to tender our grateful thanks to them, especially 
to those who went over the manuscript with me, thus 
making less the responsibility which had fallen upon 
me alone. 

We were always glad that we decided to give the book 
the form of an autobiography. He trusted me by giving 
me the utmost freedom as his biographer, and in return 
for this trust I eliminated myself, and made it my sole 
aim to give him opportunity to tell his story in his own 



XI 1 INTRODUCTION 

way. I had to think with him, to use his manner of 
speech, to voice his opinions, and to Hve his Hfe over 
again with him. It was intimate mental partnership, 
in which he found expression, whereas it was for me to 
practice literary renunciation. 

He looked upon the telling of this story as a last 
duty which he must perform. The close of his life had 
come. Silence reigned where there had been strenuous 
activity. Losing his grip on the present, his soul was 
wandering in the past. The lesser values of his life 
were receding; the mountain peaks of the larger, wider 
life were coming into view., I found that while his 
memory for definite actions had become faint, the mo- 
tives for them stood out luminous. I drew on him for 
the results of his days and nights of retrospect. They 
will be found all through the book. Very willingly he 
went with me whenever he saw me depart from the 
lines of the ordinary missionary story, and with a deep 
insight he helped me find the application in his own story 
to that larger design in foreign missions which must 
yet work itself out. 

When we were nearing the end of our work, I said 
to him, "Your readers will wonder how it was that 
wherever you went among your Telugus, and preached, 
they straightway opened their hearts and believed your 
message." He replied, "One thing I know : I loved the 
people. And when I told them in the simplest words 
that I could use about Jesus Christ and his love for 
them, they somehow believed me. Whether my listeners 
were a few, or whether they were a crowd, by the time 
I was done telling them of Jesus' love, they believed in it 
and wanted it." 

I said, "The most thoughtful of your readers will wish 
you had said something as to whether you felt aware 
of being the medium between the Master Jesus and 



INTRODUCTION Xlll 

those people, — whether any power of believing was trans- 
mitted through you." He thought a few moments and 
then replied, "I think I had better keep still about that." 
I had come to his Holy of Holies, and he refused to lift 
the curtain. I said nothing more, and saw that he was 
deep in thought, wrapped in the mysteries which per- 
haps have been revealed to him since then. 

To me — ^the comrade of ten hard, crippled years — he 
left the task of completing his book. I stayed a year 
in the room adjoining the one in which he closed his 
eyes, first in my greatly needed convalescence, then at 
work. I never lost sight of his point of view, always 
eliminating myself, always letting memory reproduce 
even the words he was wont to use. On the spiritual 
aspects throughout the story I dwelt with all the rever- 
ence which we human beings feel for that in each other 
which binds us to God. 

. E. R. C. 



CONTENTS 



PAGB 

Introduction v 

CHAPTER 

I. A Pioneer Boy in the Forties i 

II. Staking Out the Young West i8 

III. Working Through College 28 

IV. The Call of the Far East 44 

V. Around the Cape to India 55 

VI. My Apprenticeship at Missions 72 

VII. The Destined Leaders of a Movement .... 92 

VIII. Education for an Illiterate People . . . . 109 

IX. A Crisis and My Orders 123 

X. Coming by Hundreds 136 

XI. A Social Revolution 159 

XII. The Impact of West Upon East 185 

XIII. Reenforcements 210 

XIV. Marking Mission Boundaries 223 

XV. An Indian Famine 237 

XVI. Nine Thousand in Six Weeks 263 

XVII. Christendom Facing a New Pentecost . . . .291 

XVIII. A Church of Fifteen Thousand Members . . .313 

XIX. An Eastern People and Western Organization . 326 

XX. Self-Support in Practice 347 

XXI. The Response at Home 365 

XXII. The End of Life 382 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

John E. Clough Frontispiece 

FACING PAGB 

^ Map of a Portion of South India i 

Harriet Sunderland Clough 40 

' Prophetic Vision : Lyman Jewett, D.D., "Prayer Meeting Hill" 68 

"The Forerunner of a Mass Movement 92 

- The Old Order and the New : An Idol Shrine, A Baptistery . 156 

Social Betterment : A Christian Village Chapel, A Hindu Guru, 

Village Idols 192 

" John E. Clough after Seven Years in India .... 202 

'^ Practical Christianity: Famine Sufferers, Coolies Digging, 

The Buckingham Canal 248 

"^ Jonah G. Warren, D.D 272 

A Pentecostal Baptism 286 

■^ Fifteen Thousand Members: Their Church Home, Their Mis- 
sion House, Their "Dhora" on Tour . . , . . 316 

' Dr. Clough and His People 362 



SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY 
IN THE ORIENT 




MAP SHOWING A PORTION OF 

SOUTH INDIA 

OCCUPIED BY THE TELUGU8 



8CALE OF MILES 



0~10 80 *0 SO 

Stations of the AmerlcaD BapUst 
Foreign Miislon Society in 

tustTpe Madras 

Bailroads thus nnn 



Lon^tude East 



By courtesy of the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society. 



SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN 
THE ORIENT 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES 

My birth year, 1836, saw the beginning" of many en- 
terprises of a religious and philanthropic nature. Many 
of the men of that year also had these characteristics. 
The Telugu Mission and I, born at the same time, had 
similar experiences till we came to a meeting point, and 
after that we became so knitted together that the story 
of the one was also the story of the other. 

I was born in a blockhouse, on a farm near Frews- 
burg, Chautauqua County, New York, July 16, 1836. 
My parents named me John Everett after an uncle of 
mine. Western New York was at that time a new and 
unsettled country. Thrifty, resourceful families from 
the New England States were emigrating to these parts. 
Many a man who afterwards did hard work in the world 
was born into one of those pioneer families in Western 
New York. 

My father's family came originally from Wales. The 
name Clough is said to be derived from the Celtic, mean- 
ing stone. The ancestor of the American branch of the 
family sailed from London in 1635, and settled in Salis- 
bury, Massachusetts. His descendants had the staunch 
qualities of the early settlers and were ready to fight for 
their country. My grandfather shouldered his gun un- 



2 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

der Washington, during the Revolutionary War, pass- 
ing through the hard winter at Valley Forge. 

Through my mother I am of Scotch-English descent. 
Her mother was of the Scotch clan of the McEwans, 
a clan noted for piety. Her father was a Sturgeon, 
descended from a family which, it is said, originally 
came from Holland and emigrated to England in the 
twelfth century. One of her ancestors was ennobled 
for some meritorious service to an English king. Two 
Sturgeon brothers became famous leaders in the defense 
of Derry, Ireland, in 1689. The son of one of these 
brothers came to America in 1720, and settled in Penn- 
sylvania. He was my ancestor. My mother's grand- 
father fought in the war of the Revolution. Her father 
with three brothers cut their way four miles through 
the forests of Pennsylvania, and took possession of land 
which they had purchased. The town of Fairview was 
built on their property. 

Through my mother I am of the fifth generation of 
early settlers, and through my father I am the seventh 
American in a direct line. Very likely I have a good 
deal of the Yankee in my make-up, and I am proud 
of it. My love for India came afterwards, and my 
loyalty to the English Government came with it. But 
it was all grafted upon my Yankee instincts. There 
was never a time when I could not easily become stirred 
with love for my country. 

I had scarcely come into the world when my parents 
lost all their property. My father was doing well in 
the lumber business. He was a kind-hearted man, and 
people came to him for help when in trouble. Through 
loyalty to a friend he signed a note which he afterwards 
was obliged to pay in full. Everything was swept away, 
including my mother's handsome dowry. My sister re- 
members how mother stood in the doorway and looked 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES 3 

on as the horses and cattle which were part of the dowry 
were driven away. She did not blame father, for she 
knew he had acted in good faith. But my destiny was 
changed while I lay in the cradle. I grew up a poor 
man's son. 

My parents told me that when the family physician 
saw me, he said, "One continent will be too small to 
hold that boy." An old Indian chief from a reserva- 
tion of peaceful Indians — the Alleghanys — was one of 
my earliest friends. He told my mother that I would 
become a great medicine man, and ranked me thus 
among the wise men of the Indian tribes, who knew 
their hidden wisdom and communed with the Great 
Spirit. He brought me as a present a little pair of 
moccasins, done in beadwork, in the finest Indian fashion. 
I wore them as my first shoes, and learned to walk in 
them. 

Evidently I was a sturdy child, and seem to have been 
somewhat unmanageable. I would not take anything 
from hearsay, but had to test everything myself. If I 
was on the wrong track, I would not stop until I found 
it out for myself, generally by coming to grief in some 
way. When I was about four years old, my mother 
went on an errand one day to the nearest neighbors, 
about half a mile away. She left me with Jane, who 
was three years older than I. When I realized that 
mother was gone, I broke loose and started after her. 
The snow was deep, and before Jane could get someone 
to help her control me I had gone far, and had frozen 
my feet badly. On another occasion I hurt myself be- 
cause I wanted a stick which I saw when going through 
the woods with one of my brothers. I watched my 
opportunity, got the axe, and started for the stick. A 
log lay in the way. I dropped the axe over, but in climb- 



4 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

ing after it, put my hand on its edge and cut myself 
severely. 

The stories told at the fireside in my home were of 
a kind to keep my youthful mind intensely excited. The 
war of the Revolution formed a frequent topic of con- 
versation. My father often told stories about it, which 
he had heard his father tell. There were men coming 
and going who had fought in the War of 1812. Two of 
my father's brothers had served in that war. It was 
then in the recent past that the English, under stress of 
war, had agreed to pay the Indians a good price for 
the scalps of settlers. Thus my uncle was scalped, and 
hundreds of Americans at the same time. I listened and 
wished I were big enough to fight; I would have con- 
sidered it good service to kill an Englishman. 

My mother, when a girl, heard the cannonading on 
Lake Erie from Commodore Perry's fleet. She knew 
Sergeant Bird, who distinguished himself in that battle, 
carrying the flag. By a captain in command he was 
wrongfully court-martialed and sentenced to death. Com- 
modore Perry himself came riding fast, waving a flag 
to stop the execution, but he was too late. The man 
was shot. My mother told us children this story, and 
sometimes she sang a song that had been composed about 
"Gallant Bird." It is one of my earliest recollections 
that I was burning with indignation over the wrong done 
to my mother's friend. 

Then there were the Indians about whom I heard 
many stories, especially from my mother. She passed 
her girlhood in the forests, where the white settlers were 
constantly taking precautions, fearing the cruelty of the 
Indians. Only six weeks, all told, did my mother have 
opportunity to go to school. When she was fourteen 
years old she lost her mother by death. She then kept 
house for her father and took charge of two younger 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES 5 

brothers and a sister. Once she saw a gang of Indians 
approaching. She hurried the children into some hiding 
place. The men of the family were out on the fields. 
The Indians passed and did no harm. 

It all made me feel, as I listened, as if I ought to be 
fighting, no matter whether the Indians or the English. 
Often I made war on an old gander in the barn-yard. 
Whether, for the time being, he was an Indian or an 
Englishman, he was always ready for a fight. It was 
a square fight too, for if I did not look out he caught 
me and whipped me with his wings. There was a big 
grain-stack in the farm-yard, which I called my fort. 
Another little boy and I bombarded it with stones, and 
played that it was war. But the day came when a man 
brought a threshing machine and threshers. The stones 
got into the machine and stopped it every little while. 
The men swore and said it would ruin the machine. My 
father and all on the farm knew who had done it, but 
they did not tell. The other boy and I ran into the 
woods and kept out of sight, so as to escape questions. 
It was more fun telling about it afterwards than it was 
that day. 

A neighbor had obtained turkeys' eggs and had put 
them under a hen to hatch. His young son and I kept 
our eye on that old hen. We heard our parents talk 
about the time it would take, and concluded that the 
old hen was not doing right by the turkeys and ought to 
be helped. We drove her off the nest, picked the eggs 
open and got the little turkeys out — liberated them. They 
stood up a few minutes and then fell over and died. Our 
parents were ready to annihilate us, but they did not 
do it. 

I do not remember that my mother ever told me Bible 
stories, or taught me to say my evening prayers. There 
was a Sunday school some miles away to which my 



6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

brothers went, but it was too far for me. My mother's 
father had held to family prayers. Once, when the 
young people were going cranberrying, he made them 
come to prayers first, and prayed so long that their knees 
ached, while their companions stood outside waiting for 
them. A large share of his wealth went to his church. 
Soon after his death the members divided into Old 
School and New School Presbyterians, and each faction 
claimed the money and lands; they went to law about 
it and lost most of it in litigation. All this probably 
had something to do with my mother's silence about re- 
ligious matters. She let me grow up untaught. My 
father kept the Puritan Sabbath. If he saw me out in 
front of the house playing marbles, he rapped on the 
window: "Bub, it is Sunday to-day, not the day for 
play." 

A little playmate and I were discussing one day what 
we would do when we were men. Among other great 
exploits I said I was going to kill the devil. He re- 
marked, "But you cannot kill God." I replied, "There 
is no God; for I do not see him." My playmate said, 
"Yes, there is. He is everywhere." It was my great 
ambition at that time to have a pocket in my jacket. 
I therefore replied, "Then God must be in my pocket, 
and he is not there." What he said in turn, I do not 
remember. He had been taught in his home. I grew up 
a little heathen. 

When I was five or six years old, I was deeply af- 
fected by the Millerite excitement. Mr. Miller lived 
only forty miles away. Men were going over the coun- 
try saying the world was going to burn up. The aurora 
borealis was playing every night, brighter than light- 
ning, and all the northern heavens were ablaze. In 
Jamestown, a few miles away, a whole company of 
people were assembled for days, clad in white robes. 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES 7 

expecting every moment to be lifted up at the second 
coming- of our Lord. My family did not join in the 
excitement, but of course no one talked of anything else. 
I listened, and was much frightened. At night I stayed 
close to the grown people and asked them often how 
the fire was going to be put out. In the daytime I fol- 
lowed father into the woods, where he was drawing logs 
to the sawmill, and did not lose sight of him. He talked 
with me and made me forget my fear. Then, when 
nothing came of it all, I was old enough to feel the re- 
action. I was disgusted, and it made me averse to re- 
ligious excitement for the rest of my life. 

It was about this time that a missionary came and 
spoke at Jamestown. He had an idol with him, which 
was passed around. People took it home to show it to 
their families. My mother, too, had it, and she let us 
children see it. This was my introduction to foreign 
missions. 

My first day at school came when I was only five years 
old. My mother sent me with Jane and two of my 
brothers, by the short cut, a mile or two across fields 
and over fences to the little red-painted, clapboard school- 
house. I went willingly enough, it seems. The teacher 
was much loved by the children. She smiled at them, 
and then they did what she told them to do. Presently 
she called me to her desk and I went quite fearlessly. 
She said she wanted me to say my ABC. I replied, 
"But I won't say my A B C." She took the primer 
and pointed to the first letter : "There is A, now say A." 
I replied, "I won't say A.'' Next she tried me on B. 
The same answer: "I won't say B." She said, "But 
you just said B." I held my ground and said, "But I 
won't say B again." 

The other children were all smiling. The teacher was 
too wise to fight me, she said, "You have done very 



8 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

well. You have said A nicely." This did not suit me 
at all. I was mad and waited for a chance to run home. 
Recess came, and I was soon out of the door. Jane 
and the boys ran after me and held me by the shoulders 
and legs. I battled with them and would have torn 
away, if the teacher had not come. She said, "Why, 
Everett, you do not want to go home. You want to 
wear my watch.'' She put it around my neck, and told 
me to sit still and I could hear it tick. I was tame as a 
lamb after that. 

A year later I had my first day out in public. The 
volunteers of that region were to have a day for train- 
ing at Frewsburg. My father took me with him. To 
hear the cannon booming as we approached the town 
excited me a good deal. I held my father's hand tightly 
as we walked along. He showed me the horse-racing, 
and let me see the cannon at a safe distance, and bought 
raisins and crackers as a treat for me. I had led such 
an isolated life on the farm that the experiences of 
the day stirred me. 

I now began to go to the creek with the other boys 
to fish, and found that pin-hooks would not catch fish, 
though it was just as much fun. My big brothers took 
me swimming. One of them would go into the water 
with me on his back, and would let me slip off, forcing 
me thus to strike out for myself. Or if I made him 
promise not to let me slip, he would dive with me 
on his back. 

. The first public recognition of my capability happened 
one spring in the "sugar-bush." The sap from the maple 
trees in our grove was trickling into buckets. In the 
sugar-camp the sap was turned into sugar in large kettles, 
hung over a slow fire. A steady yoke of oxen went 
back and forth with the buckets. My father let me drive 
them. The old oxen knew their way by themselves, but 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES 9 

I was very proud, driving* them. This sport lasted a 
week or two. My keen interest in the maple sugar cooled 
down after the first few days. The men asked me how 
much I thought I could eat of it. I said I could manage 
a bucketful. They laughed, and when I tried and soon 
had enough they laughed more. 

When I was about eight years old, a decisive change 
was contemplated by my parents. Their attempts at 
coming back to their former prosperity had brought 
little success. They owned land in southern Wisconsin. 
This was then the Far West, and the federal government 
was holding out inducements to settlers. Rich prairie 
land could be obtained at twenty-five cents an acre. My 
mother had five boys growing up around her, three older 
and one younger than I. She wanted to settle on one 
of those large farms in the West, so that her sons could 
each take a portion and be independent, and could yet 
all be together. With that idea in mind, she was 
willing to turn her face to the Far West. Such clothing 
as the family was supposed to need for a year or 
two was made ready. Everything that could not be con- 
veniently taken along in two large wagons was sold. 
Early in September, 1844, we started. 

My mother's ancestral home was on our way. We 
halted there, and found ourselves in the midst of political 
excitement. Henry Clay and James K. Polk were in 
contest for the presidential election. A great mass meet- 
ing was held at Erie, ten miles away. During several 
days wagons were passing our place, drawn by many 
horses — one had twenty-four — decorated with flags and 
ridden by boys in uniform. The wagons were trimmed 
with high poles on which were raccoons and bunting. 
My youthful American enthusiasm was at its height. 
With some young cousins I took my stand on a pile of 
stones near the road and, expressive of the sentiment of 



lO SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

the family, shouted, "Hurrah for Henry Clay !'* at every 
passing wagon. When not shouting we had to fight a 
nest of bumble-bees living in that pile of stone. Six 
old ganders were constantly attacking us. We had to 
club them and stone them and make them withdraw, in 
the intervals of our shouting. It was great sport. 

A long, tedious journey was now before us. As far 
as Cleveland — ^then a small town — there was a fair road. 
Then the hardships began. The Maumee Swamp was 
only thirty miles wide, but progress was slow, going 
bump, bump over the logs which had been laid down, 
making a corduroy road. When within sixty miles of 
Chicago we had an anxious night. We had retired, 
mother and the younger children in the wagons, father 
and the older boys rolled in blankets under the wagons, 
in regular emigrant fashion, when some one noticed that 
the horses had stampeded. The fear was that they had 
been stolen, and were even now being driven over the 
prairies, beyond our reach. Father and my three brothers 
started out in every direction in search of them. Mother 
stayed by the wagons and blew a tin dinner horn every 
few minutes, so that father and the boys might know how 
to find their way back. It was a long night— I remember 
it well. I was awake, staying close to mother, learning 
how to go through anxious hours. At last, toward morn- 
ing, one of the brothers appeared, riding back with the 
strayed horses. 

We had gone just beyond Chicago when snow fell. 
Winter had overtaken us. Father went into the nearest 
village, hired a small house, and there we abode till 
spring. A series of reverses now came upon us. It was 
decided that father should start out with one of the 
wagons and spy out the land in Wisconsin. He had gone 
a few miles, and was holding a pail of water up to the 
horses to drink, when they became frightened at some- 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES II 

thing, knocked him down and ran the wagon over 
him. With ribs and shoulder broken he was brought 
back to us. He had been an unusually strong man. 
From the effects of this accident he never fully recovered. 
While he lay crippled, he heard that the land in Wis- 
consin which he owned was nearly worthless. It was 
decided to settle on a farm in Winnebago County, 
Illinois. 

On this farm I passed two or three of the hardest 
years of my life. If it was so ordained that I was to 
endure poverty, perhaps the clean poverty of pioneer 
Hfe was the least objectionable kind. My parents shel- 
tered me in our home. I was never exposed to the rough 
usage of those who stand ready to grind down the chil- 
dren of the poor. But my boyhood was nipped by an 
early frost. I could never again be like other boys. 
From that time on life brought me work, incessant work. 
I have always felt that through those hard experiences, 
something went out of my life which never came back. 

There is one thing that I learned during those years : 
I learned how it feels to go hungry. For one who was 
to become a missionary to thousands of the poorest 
people in India, who have to go hungry many a day in 
the year, perhaps it was necessary training. I never 
forgot it. Many a time when those poor, outcaste people 
in India complained that they had only one meal a day 
to eat, and that of a cheap kind of porridge, I told them, 
"You cannot tell me anything about poverty. Porridge 
and potatoes was all my mother had to give me during 
one winter, and not enough of that." They knew by 
the look on my face that I was telling them the truth, 
and it made a strong bond of fellowship between us. 

My mother rose to the emergency and kept the wolf 
from the door. Too proud to tell her wealthy brothers 
in the East of our trouble, she found ways to tide 



12 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

US over to better times. She procured bran, sifted it, 
and baked bread of it. Our supply of clothes was giving 
out. When we children had gone to bed, she mended our 
clothes, Washed them and dried them by the fire over 
night, and thus clean she sent us to school the next morn- 
ing. The children of the older settlers had well-filled 
lunch baskets. I often hid behind the schoolhouse and 
ate my piece of cornbread there. There were few settlers 
who had not gone through times such as we were en- 
during. No one felt degraded by temporary poverty, 
which was bound to yield to thrift and bounty. Still, it 
was a grinding experience. 

The bright spot to me in all the dreariness of those 
years was my poultry yard. I was only nine years old 
when I was given the chores to do, that my father and 
brothers might devote themselves to the hard work of 
the farm. There was one cow to tend, and there was 
a humble little family of hens, which began to interest 
me. I noticed the fowls of neighboring farmers. I 
could not see a nice fowl without wanting it. By ex- 
change or gift I came into possession of Shanghais, 
geese, ducks and guinea hens. After a few years mine 
was the finest poultry yard in all that section. The 
eggs, taken to the country store, provided groceries for 
our table. No one interfered with me about that poultry 
yard. I was a Yankee boy and wanted to be boss over 
something. My family respected my rights. I took 
great pride in my Shanghai rooster. Some neighbors 
gave him to me when he was a mere chick. I guarded 
him as the apple of my eye. He had a crowing acquaint- 
ance with every rooster of the neighborhood. None 
were as big as he. We moved to a farm about a mile 
away. He was not satisfied. Before daylight the first 
morning he began to communicate with his friends. By 
crowing back and forth he found his way through the 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES I3 

forest to the old place. All the neighborhood heard of 
this performance, and how I had to go and bring the 
big fellow home in my arms. It was something to 
live for. 

As I grew older I came into more work. One sum- 
mer I had to shepherd about six hundred sheep, driving 
them out on the open prairie in the early morning, keep- 
ing the dogs and wolves off during the day, and bring- 
ing them home in the evening. It was tedious work for 
a boy. The silly sheep used to stare at me and bleat and 
run around in stupid fashion. I did not see how any- 
one could love a sheep. It was heavier work when my 
brother Cyrus bought a plow for breaking prairie land, 
and wanted me to drive the six yoke of oxen hitched 
to the plow. There was demand for such work and it 
was well paid. During those years I helped the farmers 
to bring many an acre of prairie land under cultiva- 
tion. 

My education meanwhile was not neglected. An in- 
capable teacher had been presiding over our school. The 
parents of the children were dissatisfied. They talked 
it over. My parents knew of a superior young woman, 
and my father, acting on behalf of the school board, 
went himself and engaged her and brought her. She 
proved to be one of the best teachers I ever had. It was 
a happy winter for me. As the oldest pupil in the 
school, I had the right of way to her all the time. I 
began to grow hungry for an education. That good 
woman fostered in me ambition which bore fruit. 

About this time, when I was fourteen years old, an- 
other good woman, the wife of Judge Farwell, spoke 
words to me that touched me more deeply than any- 
thing I had thus far known. She woke me up. There 
was not a woman in all that region more respected than 
she. Cyrus had worked on her farm, and sometimes 



14 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

she engaged me for smaller jobs. She often spoke kindly 
to me, and gave me presents. One day she brought me a 
thick book. It was the "Antiquities of Greece." She 
said, "See, Everett, you do not understand this now, but 
before many years you will be reading just such books 
as this, and you will want it then." Cyrus heard her say 
this and reported it to the family. I went home with 
my prize, and no one knew how the hidden springs of 
my nature were stirred. I had been marked for a career 
beyond the range of my father's farm. The call of the 
world began to ring in my ears. 

It seems the boys of the neighborhood looked up to 
me. I was in touch with their boyish affairs, and ap- 
pear to have given therii sage advice at times, to 
help them keep out of trouble. They said, "Everett is 
going to be a lawyer." As a boy, among boys, I was 
singled out for a legal career. Sometimes, as my par- 
ents sat together, I went to them, and in a way that 
could only be pleasing to them I urged that something 
be changed, or some new scheme be undertaken. After 
listening to me, my father would say, "Well, maybe 
Everett is right. I think we had better do that way." 

Meanwhile, after four or five years of hard work, we 
had come into a good degree of prosperity. A railroad 
passed through our land, enabling us to sell at large 
profit. With the proceeds of this sale and our hard- 
earned money we decided to move to Iowa. We were 
following on the track of the Indians. Iowa had been 
the hunting ground of several original tribes. By suc- 
cessive treaties the government had purchased it from 
them. Settlers were encouraged to take possession of 
the rich prairie land now open to them. It was at 
best a hazardous undertaking. We knew that we would 
be in danger of Indian cruelty for years to come. Seven 
years later, only about a hundred miles northwest of us. 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES 15 

the white population of the state was nearly annihilated 
by the Indians. However, we decided to run the risk. 
My father staked off nearly sixteen hundred acres of 
beautiful prairie land in Iowa by what was called "the 
right of squatter sovereignty," forty acres to a block. 
Our property was on the section called Strawberry Point. 
It had been named thus by some soldiers, passing through 
to Indian wars, who found acres of wild strawberries 
growing there. 

When we moved over to Iowa we were quite a caravan 
of wagons, horses, cows, six yoke of oxen, and pro- 
visions enough to last a year. Again on the outskirts 
of civilization, we found ourselves among settlers who 
were going through privations similar to those which 
we endured a few years previously. Some of them had 
not seen bread made of flour for a long time. My 
mother had flour enough to last our family a year. The 
memory of her own hard times was strong upon her. 
She wanted to divide with everyone. She gave away of 
her tea, a luxury among settlers, and often she ate corn- 
bread herself that she might have more flour to give 
away. We were prosperous, but I had to continue to 
work hard. During the winters I went to school, walk- 
ing several miles back and forth. In summer, as hired 
help was hard to obtain in that thinly populated part of 
the state, I had to take my place with the men. Only 
fifteen years old, I did a man's work from that time on. 
It did not hurt me, but I think if I had not worked so 
strenuously during that growing period, I might have 
been a few inches taller, and stood six feet in height. 

I began now to reach out: life was rich with hope. 
I was thirsting for experience, and went with zest into 
everything that came my way. On a Fourth of July 
there was to be a big celebration in a town ten miles 
away. The farmers scattered here and there were all go- 



l6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

ing, leaving only a few of the older people at home on 
the farms. From our neighborhood two large wagons, 
trimmed with greens, were filled with sight-seers. One 
belonged to us, with six yoke of oxen hitched in front. 
My brothers said, "Everett shall drive." The women of 
our family had made a large flag, which was fastened 
over the wagon so that it waved over my head. There 
was not a prouder boy in Iowa that day than I, driving 
those twelve oxen. Our wagon was cheered all along 
the road, and the crowd gathered to see it when we 
arrived where the political stump speeches were to be 
delivered. 

At the marriage of my sister Jane I again asserted 
myself. She had been a good comrade to me. To hide 
my feelings in losing her, I arranged for a "shivaree" 
on the night of the wedding. I gathered the lads of the 
vicinity, and with horns, bells, tin pans, and horse fiddles 
we marched around the house, while it was snowing 
hard. Then we halted, and called for the bride and 
groom. 

Always without fear of anyone, I made an exhorter 
beat a hasty retreat from our barn one day. I was 
there with my brothers, cleaning wheat, when this man 
came in, and without waiting for an invitation began 
to exhort. I knew him, and considered him a rank 
hypocrite. I reached up, took from a beam a pack of 
cards, and holding them toward him, asked him whether 
he would not have a game of euchre. Thus foiled, he 
began to hurl curses at me, but the forbidding looks of 
my brothers warned him that our bam was not a good 
place for him. 

I was self-righteous in those days. I considered my- 
self as good as anyone, and better than some who were 
doing a good deal of preaching. My mother could not 
persuade me to go to Sunday school any more. I felt 



I 



A PIONEER BOY IN THE FORTIES 1/ 

myself too good. The Methodists were holding revival 
meetings in a big barn. Jane and two of my brothers 
went and were deeply impressed. They urged me to 
come, but' I refused. I had heard some Universalists 
talk about the ultimate redemption of everyone. I used 
to say, "If God has any account against me, let him 
send in his bill, and I will see whether I cannot pay." 

One Sunday I took the gun to go shooting. Father 
said, "It is Sunday, do not go.'* I said I was going to 
bring a buck home and went. The breach-pin blew 
out of the gun, gave me a deep gash across my fore- 
head and drove the powder into my face. I came home 
and urged Jane to take a needle and pick the powder out. 
She was nearly sick with the sight of so much blood. 
I had no pity on her, and while digging out the powder 
she gave vent to her feelings by telling me what she 
thought about my going shooting on Sunday, and my 
general air of self-sufficiency. 

The time came for me to leave my father's house. My 
early years had all been passed on the borders of civiliza- 
tion. I was now to penetrate into an uninhabited wil- 
derness. 



II 

STAKING OUT THE YOUNG WEST 

Early in 1853, when I was nearly seventeen years 
old, I came home one evening from the plow, after 
breaking new land all day, and saw covered wagons and 
some mules near the house. Evidently strangers had 
come. This was nothing new. No traveler was turned 
hungry from my father's door. His was squatter hos- 
pitality, with the latch-string out. 

Our guest this time was Mr. W. I. Anderson, a 
United States surveyor. When on our way to Iowa, 
two years before, we had stayed at his home in Dubuque. 
He, with his surveying party, now came to us. They 
were going to northern Minnesota to survey a tract of 
land under contract with the government. 

Mr. Anderson had a talk with my father. He told 
him that he had his company made up, but still lacked 
a man who could turn his hand to anything. This post 
he now offered to me. My father was slow to consent. 
His family was yet together, and he was not willing 
to let his son go into the wilds of Minnesota without 
some guarantee for his safety. Mr. Anderson promised 
to pay me twenty-five dollars in gold per month, furnish 
everything, and see that no harm came to me. It was 
a fabulous price to offer an inexperienced boy. I wanted 
to go in order to get into something new, and to make 
money. Cyrus put in a word at this juncture. He re- 

18 



STAKING OUT THE YOUNG WEST IQ 

membered what the wife of Judge Farwell said in his 
hearing about the work in the world which she expected 
me to do. He thought this post with the surveyors 
might lead to something else for me. He spoke in 
favor of my going, and my parents yielded. My mother 
packed my supply of clothes into a two-bushel bag; it 
was put on the wagon, and off we started early the fol- 
lowing morning for Minnesota, then an almost unknown 
land. 

Ten days later we crossed the Iowa boundary. Now 
we had no roads before us, not even a wagon track. We 
picked our way along the banks of the Cedar River, and 
after a few days reached our camp. Near it a family 
of squatters had recently settled on a claim. They had 
built a little blockhouse and called the place Austin — a 
large town to-day. Work began. My chief gave me a 
task of a general nature. I carried the surveyor's chain 
and followed those who marked the lines. The demarca- 
tion posts were laid upon mules and brought along. 
There were miles of walking to do each day, and hard 
work for me with axe and spade, which I had to carry. 
The country was wholly uninhabited, except by Sioux 
Indians and rattlesnakes. Of the latter we killed on the 
lines about six a day. We saw roving bands of Sioux 
Indians frequently. They generally appeared friendly, 
but the half-breeds who passed that way told us stories 
of their cruel doings. 

My new life had pleasant features. The men were 
kind-hearted, we had a good cook, abundant supplies 
and enough to eat, and it was a free life out in God's 
open country. But I was a very homesick boy. I had 
never been away from home before and there was no 
way of hearing from my family. If I had known the 
road, I might have deserted. But the Indian trail used 
by the surveyors was too winding and intricate for 



20 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

me, — I had to stay. One day the chief sent me to find 
my way three or four miles, correct several posts and 
return to camp before dark. I did my work, and then, 
thinking that I was miles beyond the hearing of any 
human being, I gave vent to my pent-up homesick feel- 
ings by crying aloud. A slight noise aroused me. I 
looked up, and saw, only a few rods away, partly con- 
cealed under the overhanging limbs of a large bur-oak 
tree, three Sioux Indians on ponies, war-paint and 
feathers on, with tomahawks and spears all ready for 
the fray. At the time the Sioux were at war with the 
Chippewas. They realized that they were seen, gave a 
whoop and galloped off. I. was so frightened, I ran back 
to the camp as quick as my legs could carry me. My 
homesickness was gone. I held out like a man. 

After my return home, in the fall of 1853, I heard 
that a high school had recently been opened at West 
Union, only thirty miles away, and that two young men 
whom I knew were there as students. Here now was my 
opportunity. I had been longing for an education, but 
in that newly settled state the little district schools were 
generally second or third rate, and I was unwilling to 
go to any of them. Higher institutions were opened 
during those years, but none as yet in that part of 
Iowa. This high school, however, was within my reach. 
Cyrus again was on my side; my parents agreed with 
him. I took some of my newly earned money and walked 
the thirty miles to West Union. 

I did hard work there that winter. Not willing to 
pay out my money for board, I worked for that. I went 
to the proprietor of the only good hotel in West Union, 
a retired Baptist preacher, and asked him whether he 
had any work for me to do. He said he had, so I 
agreed to stay. I was to saw wood for the stoves, light 
the fires, be hostler of stable and barn, and in return 



STAKING OUT THE YOUNG WEST 21 

for this was to be treated as a regular boarder, eating 
at the same table with the rest. It meant getting up 
early in the morning, being on hand at noon and again 
in the evening. Soon the proprietor expected me to 
act for him in his absence. This taught me to be mindful 
of the comfort of strangers. It was useful training, 
for later, in Ongole, I often had my compound full of 
hundreds of people to whom I was practically host. 

In my studies during those four or five months I had 
a definite end in view. I had taken my bearings among 
the surveyors, and knew that if I had technical knowl- 
edge I might rise to something higher than hatchet- 
carrier among them. I went straight into the studies 
that would supply my need, and obtained what I wanted, 
though handicapped all the time by lack of adequate pre- 
liminary education. It was this circumstance, partly, 
that led to a remark from the principal of the high 
school that *'in Clough a good farmer would be spoiled 
to make a poor lawyer." Somehow my ambition to be- 
come a lawyer was always known to those with whom 
I came in contact. This remark, when I heard it, had 
a discouraging effect upon me. The wife of my em- 
ployer, too, heard of it, and was indignant. She told 
me not to mind it, that she was sure I was going to 
come out ahead in the end, and that I would some day 
be a lawyer. I never forgot how I felt when I had to 
fight the discouragement produced by that remark. Many 
a Telugu lad, in after years, was given a chance to 
learn, no matter how unpromising he might seem, if I 
saw that he had set his heart on rising in life. I 
could easily put myself in his place, for I had been there 
myself. 

Religious influences still had no hold on me. Revival 
meetings were held that winter. Far from showing any 
interest in them, another lad and I decided to have some 



22 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

fun. We went into the meeting house unobserved, took 
all the candles, tunneled small holes into them at in- 
tervals, and filled them with powder. In the evening, 
during the meeting, as the candles burned, there was a 
small, sizzling explosion occasionally; the light went 
out by the force of it. It worried the deacons. No one 
had any peace that night. Those in power wished they 
knew who played this trick and regarded us two lads 
with suspicion. But we took care to look innocent. 

Spring came, and again I joined the surveying party 
on an expedition to Minnesota. Work this year was 
between Lake Pippin and Cannon River. My chief knew 
that I had been at school during the winter and lost no 
time in giving me a chance to apply my knowledge. He 
brought out a compass, put it into my hands, told me 
what to do, and ordered men to go with me as chain- 
men, carrying axe and spade. I accepted the compass 
with fear and trembling and started out to do as I had 
been told. On our return to camp in the evening I re- 
ported to the chief, and he was pleased. He saw that 
he could trust me. The camp was divided into two 
companies; the chief worked with one of them, while 
he placed me in charge of the other, with about six men 
under me, all much older than I. We camped together, 
but every morning we separated and did not meet again 
till evening. For several weeks I gave a minute ac- 
count to the chief every evening of what I had done, 
and showed him my notebook. Then my daily re- 
ports became merely nominal and after a time ceased 
altogether. Thus we worked till winter came and we 
returned to Iowa. 

My family, meanwhile, had made plans for mercantile 
business. They wanted to open a general merchandise 
store at Strawberry Point, and I was to be store-keeper. 
I was sent to Chicago with a team to buy a small stock 



STAKING OUT THE YOUNG WEST 2$ 

of goods. Business was fair and the prospects were 
g-ood. But the supposition was that I would take kindly 
to work behind the counter. Here my family was mis- 
taken. After roaming over the prairies, the confinement 
behind that counter was more than I could bear, and 
I longed to be free. When spring came nothing could 
hold me. The stock of goods was sold at cost, the part- 
nership dissolved, and I thought I deserved credit because 
I had stayed behind that counter one winter. 

Soon I was on my way again to Minnesota with my 
former companions and employer. Our field began about 
fifty miles north of Minneapolis — a village then. Mr. 
Anderson had decided to place more responsibility upon 
me. The work of surveying township and meridian lines 
he kept to himself; the work of dividing into sections 
he gave to me. This necessitated two camps. Often 
we did not meet more than once a month. I was only 
nineteen years old, not eligible to direct appointment 
under the government. I was sworn in as United States 
Deputy Surveyor, Mr. Anderson standing between me 
and the government. My official certificate served me, 
twenty years later, when I wanted a contract from the 
Indian Government for digging three miles of canal in 
the time of famine, to keep starving Christians alive. 
English officials then respected my United States cer- 
tificate, and gave me what I wanted. 

I was young for so much responsibility, but Mr. An- 
derson was always ready to help me. Once I found an 
error in the township lines and could not make my work 
close. I sent a messenger to him, who had to trace him 
and find him in that wilderness. He sent back word to 
stick stakes and wait till he came. Another time a 
settler, who had a valuable farm site, told me in a per- 
suasive manner that if the lines were made to pass along 
a certain boundary on his claim, he had one hundred 



24 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

dollars in gold to give me. This to a poor young man 
was quite a temptation. I knew I could bring the lines 
to suit him by just shortening and lengthening the chains 
a little. But though religious convictions had no part in 
my life at that time, my father's Puritan ideas of honor 
and integrity served me well. I refused the hundred dol- 
lars in gold and laid the lines with mathematical ex- 
actness. Winter overtook us in Minnesota. Snow fell 
as we turned homeward, late in November. There were 
times when we had to clear the ground before we could 
pitch our tent, and then, just outside the tent, we built 
a huge fire of logs and kept it up all night. We reached 
home in very cold weather. 

My chief told me that the work of the following sum- 
mer would be in Dakota. The government was receiv- 
ing applications from prospective settlers for claims in 
that uninhabited portion of the country. Surveyors were 
being sent there to divide the land into townships and 
subdivide into sections. We were to go where settlers 
had not yet penetrated. As there were lakes and water- 
courses where our work would lie, the chief advised me 
to get the technical knowledge for this branch of sur- 
veying. There was a retired teacher of mathematics 
settled on a farm not far from my home, and I studied 
with him that winter. 

I knew when I started for the wild west for the 
fourth time that this would be my last campaign; for 
I was not willing to look upon surveying as my calling 
in life — I wanted to become a lawyer. We pushed for- 
ward now, beyond the region where we had done our 
previous surveying, and came to the very confines of 
civilization. Near St. Cloud — a village then — a squatter 
had settled who made it his business to keep a depot of 
all kinds of supplies and articles needed by those going 
further into the wilderness. We replenished our stock 



STAKING OUT THE YOUNG WEST 2$ 

of provisions and were now ready to move on. Just 
then Mr. Anderson was called home to Dubuque on some 
business. He left the whole contract in my hands, with 
all that pertained to it, telling me to report to him by 
letter whenever we found it necessary to send a man 
from our camp in the wilderness to the squatter near 
St. Cloud for fresh supplies. 

We now struck off for the tract which we were to 
survey between the Crow River and the Red River of 
the North. There were no settlers and no roads; we 
had to pick our way through forests and across water- 
courses. At times I had to strap my clothes and com- 
pass on my back and swim across some river too deep 
to ford. It took a week to reach the place where we 
could pitch our camp and begin work. We were then 
about one hundred and fifty miles away from the nearest 
settler. But Sioux Indians and rattlesnakes were all 
about us. 

During that summer the Indians had murdered forty 
settlers near Spirit Lake, Iowa. From Fort Snelling 
our government had sent out an expedition to demand 
the murderers. The Indians had thus been followed and 
overtaken. Part of the tribe were willing the murderers 
should go; part were determined they should not go. 
Finally they were given up and the soldiers started back 
to the fort, but their steps were dogged by hundreds 
of Indians, bent on rescue. Our surveying party had 
heard of the murder and the expedition, but we did not 
know of the outcome. One day, out on the lines, we 
heard report of a cannon, repeated five minutes later; 
it continued thus all day. We knew that this meant 
trouble. After completing our day's work, we returned 
to camp and there discussed the situation. Several of 
the men were in favor of fleeing to the settlements. This 



26 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

was soon voted down, and we determined, if necessary, 
to sell our lives as dearly as possible. 

We prepared for the night. Our mules were picketed 
around our tent, as sentinels. With their acute sense of 
smell and hearing, and their fear of Indians, they were 
sure to indicate by snorting if there were any approach- 
ing, crawling in the long grass. We took turns in re- 
maining awake to watch. Revolvers were loaded and 
under our pillows. Morning came and we went to our 
work. Toward noon a half-breed came riding that way. 
He said on the previous day several thousand Indians 
had war-paint on, enraged because a soldier had shot 
one of the prisoners who was trying to escape. They 
wanted to kill the little company of soldiers and rescue 
the prisoners. The next step would have been a massacre 
of all the surveyors and settlers. The United States 
commander withdrew his soldiers to a little knoll, planted 
the cannon on top, and gave notice that he would shoot 
if the Indians came near. They did come near, but only 
blank cartridges were fired at them. This was the shoot- 
ing which we had heard the previous day. By night the 
Indians had grown tired and had scattered. The half- 
breed said if the commander had fired loaded cartridges 
just once, not one of us would have escaped death. 

We worked hard that summer in Dakota. I enjoyed 
my independent position and appeared to be popular with 
the men. There were fifteen of them, all older than I. 
They used to say among themselves that no matter how 
hard Clough made them work during the week, on Sun- 
days no one could make him move. Swearing was not 
allowed; we tried to live clean lives. No home mis- 
sionary ever penetrated as far as our camp. The nearest 
church, held in a log cabin, was more than two hundred 
miles away. My sister, knowing this, offered me her 
little Testament, when I was leaving home for Dakota; 



STAKING OUT THE YOUNG WEST 2/ 

she said it would not take much room in my bag. But 
I replied, "You had better keep that for yourself; you 
at home may need it more than we out there." 

Autumn came, and the work was finished. I sold out 
supplies, paid the men and started down the Mississippi 
to Dubuque. My chief, though one thousand miles away, 
had felt satisfied that our work was well done. I re- 
ported to him now, presented my account, and gave back 
the money left unexpended. He never looked at the 
account and took the money without counting it. During 
the six months in Dakota I had spent — for a boy — a mint 
of money. I now became a resident in the Anderson 
home, and my chief gave me the use of his large study 
to write up my field notes for the surveyor-general in 
Washington. This took several weeks. My four years 
as surveyor thus came to a close. I had been happy 
and successful in that calling. It was something which 
would be open to me in future. Other work drew me 
irresistibly. 



Ill 

WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 

The man who had been my chief during my four 
years as surveyor now took an important part in guid- 
ing my next step. I had a talk with Mr. Anderson and 
he asked about my plans. I told him that I wanted to 
go to some good school for at least a year and then to 
read law. It was one of my sayings at that time that I 
intended to be "one of the wealthiest men and best law- 
yers in Iowa by the time I was forty." 

I had money enough on hand to go East and enter 
one of the older institutions there. But I had a patriotic 
love for Iowa. It had ceased to be a territory and be- 
come a state only eleven years previously. I had grown 
with its growth. I owned a portion of a farm of rich 
Iowa land. I knew that if, later on, I reached out after 
a political career, Iowa would offer me all the oppor- 
tunities I wanted. Moreover, I was a product of Iowa's 
rudimentary system of education. I had attended its 
little district schools; I had been in one of its high 
schools, soon abandoned because the state was not ready 
for such schools. I saw that I must now join the sons 
and daughters of other pioneer families in an institu- 
tion which had a preparatory department as well as a 
collegiate course. There was as yet no thought of a 
state university. The religious life of the state had 
to provide for its higher education. Each denomination 

28 



I 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 29 

represented in the population wanted its own school. 
Able professors, called from colleges in the East, were 
on the teaching staff of these new institutions. To one 
of them I wanted to go. But to which? 

There was the point : I belonged to no church ; I felt 
allegiance to no religious body. I cared nothing whether 
a college was Methodist or Baptist or anything else. Mr. 
Anderson said in later years : "Clough asked me, * Where 
is the best school in Iowa ?' and I answered, *In Burling- 
ton.' " The men who had an intimate knowledge of my 
early life said to one another afterwards, "Clough at 
that juncture was passed from one Baptist hand to 
another." 

My chief was a leading man in the Baptist church at 
Dubuque. He never talked with me about religious mat- 
ters, but I felt his influence, and he was a good friend 
to me. He had a brother who was a prominent min- 
ister in the Baptist denomination in the eastern states. 
This brother had a classmate and friend in college, 
Dr. G. J. Johnson, who, filled with zeal, came to Iowa, 
settled in Burlington, and began a Baptist church there. 
When he came West he soon met the surveyor Anderson, 
who was henceforth included in the friendship of the two 
classmates. Dr. Johnson often came to Dubuque, a wel- 
come guest at the Anderson home. He never wearied 
talking of the first Baptist college in Iowa, which he had 
recently helped to found in Burlington. Mr. Anderson 
had decided to send his son to attend it. I relied on his 
judgment in the matter. I thought what was good for 
his son would be good for me. I requested him to write 
on my behalf to Dr. Johnson, who was secretary of the 
school. The reply came to send me on. The tie of 
friendship between three men had thus brought about 
one of the most far-reaching decisions of my life. 

I went to my home for a few days to tell my par- 



30 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

cnts of my plans, and brought my trunk. Mr. Anderson 
asked me to take charge of his son as an elder brother. 
He took us in his carriage to the Mississippi, bought our 
tickets and put us on board the "War Eagle." In bid- 
ding me good-bye, he pulled his fine hunter watch out 
of his pocket, and handed it to me, saying, "Take this 
as a memento of your faithfulness and my affection for 
you.'* Five minutes more and the plank was drawn. I 
was off for a new experience in life. This was in the 
autumn of 1857. 

I knew in a general way that Burlington University, in 
which I was now to become a student, had a theological 
department. This did not disturb me, for I did not see 
how it could affect me. I did not realize till the spirit 
pervading the institution had caught me and carried me 
with it, that it tended in the direction of helping a man 
to become a preacher. In those pioneer days men felt 
the call to preach whose education had not gone beyond 
the little district schools. They could give a few years 
only to their training. Schools like the one at Bur- 
lington met their need. These men were full of fervor. 
They stood ready, even as students, to labor for the 
conversion of any one who was not an avowed, active 
Christian. It now happened that I became the roommate 
of one of these men. 

Mr. Anderson, in his application for his son and my- 
self, had requested that a room in the dormitory be given 
to us to occupy together. We called on Dr. Lorenzo 
B. Allen, the president of the institution, who re- 
ceived us very heartily. I was immediately impressed 
by the genial kindness of this man and his scholarly 
bearing, and became attached to him from the first. The 
school year had already begun. He told us with regret 
that he could not give us a room together, but that we 
each would have to share a room with someone else. 



I 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 3 1 

This did not suit me at all, but I had determined to stay 
and to like it, come what might. Dr. Allen took me to 
a room in the northeast corner, on the third floor of 
the red brick building which served as a dormitory and 
for class-room purposes. The room contained just two 
hard beds, two plain tables, two hard chairs, a washstand, 
a bookshelf, and a stove. He introduced me to my room- 
mate, A. D. McMichael, who appeared to be a good, hon- 
est fellow. But while I admired his honesty, sobriety, 
and manliness I felt that I had no use for his piety. 

McMichael had the ministry in view. He was later 
for many years a faithful home missionary on the Pacific 
Coast. The roommate who had just left him shared his 
aspirations, and the two men had formed the habit of 
reading a chapter in the Bible and praying together every 
night before retiring. It was a disappointment to Mc- 
Michael when his roommate's funds ran low and he was 
compelled to leave and teach a country school out on 
the prairie that winter. No sooner was the vacancy made 
than I stepped in. McMichael took it for granted that I 
would now join him in reading the Bible and praying, but 
there he was mistaken. I told him frankly that I was a 
skeptic, but if such was his habit to go right on, and 
added, *T guess I can stand it if you can." I proposed 
that we draw a chalk line through the middle of the room, 
and that he could pray on his side, while I stayed on 
mine. We never drew any chalk mark ; we were both too 
hard at work to stoop to such nonsense. But there is no 
doubt that in my mind there was a chalk line through the 
middle of the room, and I continued busy with my books, 
while with half an ear I heard my roommate read his 
chapter and mention my name in his prayer night after 
night. I felt quite free to say to him that I had no use 
for this sort of thing. 

I had been in the red brick dormitory only three days 



32 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

when a prophecy was passed along the building about me. 
There was a student in the institution, J. B. Knight, after- 
ward a Baptist preacher on the Pacific Coast, who used to 
see visions. When I arrived on a Saturday he was not 
in the building ; he had gone away over Sunday to preach 
in a town on the prairie. Monday, after he returned, he 
met me in the corridor and asked, "Are you a new- 
comer ?" I replied that I was. 

"And have you come here to school?" 

"Yes." 

He went upstairs and said to his roommate, W. A. 
Eggleston, later Baptist pastor in several towns in Iowa 
and Minnesota : 

"Another Baptist preacher has come to this institu- 
tion." 

"Do you mean that new man, Clough?" 

"Yes, that is the man." 

"Why, that man is not even converted, and he will not 
hesitate to tell you that he does not pretend to be a Chris- 
tian." 

"It makes no difference," Knight replied, "that man is 
a Baptist preacher, and you will know it some day." 

I soon found myself in happy social surroundings in 
Burlington. The religious life entered into everything. 
On Sunday I went regularly to Dr. Allen's Bible class, 
in the Baptist Sunday school. He invited me to this when 
I arrived. I felt it a courtesy, and could not have re- 
fused. He was a spiritually minded man, and I prized 
the contact with him as my teacher. I soon became ac- 
quainted with Deacon and Mrs. Hawley of the Baptist 
church. They opened their home to me. Mrs. Hawley 
mothered me. If they talked to me about letting my 
skepticism go I did not resent it. Their hospitality was 
so genuine. 

I found a friend in Alonzo Abernethy, by natural en- 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 33 

dowment the most scholarly student in the college. Later 
we were roommates for about a year. He stood for a 
type of sterling Christian character which I thoroughly 
respected. He, too, belonged to the Baptist church. Long 
years after, when I came home from India to get twenty- 
five men and a hundred thousand dollars for the Telugu 
Mission, I saw Abernethy standing before me, at the 
Iowa Baptist State Convention. Forgetting those who 
had gathered about us, I put my arms around his neck 
and we held each other thus, both profoundly moved. 
He had had the kind of career which I, long ago, thought 
possible for myself. He went to the war and rose to the 
rank of colonel; he was a member of the Iowa legisla- 
ture; later he was superintendent of public instruction in 
Iowa, and was holding important posts. 

I had another friend among the students, Addison C. 
Williams, a fine fellow, who later became a Methodist 
minister in several large towns. His sister was my class- 
mate in Greek. I thought highly of them both, and often 
went to the Methodist church with them, where they were 
zealous workers. Their pastor made me welcome, a 
warm-hearted, enthusiastic man. Baptist influences were 
round about me, but the Methodists, too, had their hold 
on me. What turned the scales ? 

The Baptists had a pastor in Burlington whose influ- 
ence counted for a good deal. Dr. G. J. Johnson was a 
leading man among the Baptist pastors in Iowa and was 
a strong personality. He had come West ten years be- 
fore when there were not more than a thousand Baptists 
in Iowa and only one in Burlington. His church was 
now in a flourishing condition. Since he was the origi- 
nator, and in one sense the ruling spirit of the college, 
it came about as a matter of course that faculty and stu- 
dents, almost in a body, came to the services in his 
church. I was thus naturally drawn into the circle of 



34 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

his influence. I listened to his preaching Sunday after 
Sunday, and I heard nothing in the way of compromise. 
It was the pure gospel — Christ and him crucified. And 
Pastor Johnson held to the old-fashioned idea of conver- 
sion as a new birth. He was a staunch Baptist, too; 
Baptist teachings and Baptist democratic principles were 
dear to him. He expounded them often and fearlessly. 
I heard him, and I could not deny that if my skepticism 
must go, then here was what I wanted. 

A number of weeks passed thus. Then came a change. 
I have never told the story of my conversion in detail; 
perhaps there is no detail to tell. My friend Abernethy 
said in later years that my conversion changed me greatly. 
I think he was right. During those first months in Bur- 
lington I was keenly alive to the influences surrounding 
me. My fellow-students had come out of that same 
pioneer life in which I had grown to manhood. Most of 
them were rugged in demeanor, some perhaps a little 
uncouth in appearance. There was a tendency among 
them to take undue interest in the affairs of each other. 
Notwithstanding all this, I saw that they had a motive in 
life, and thereby stood higher than most of the men 
whom I had known among the surveyors. Those relig- 
ious convictions, which I had thus far evaded wherever 
I came across them, were a dominant factor in their lives. 
I realized that active Christian experience could give a 
nobility of character which I must share or fall behind. 

It all wore on me. The boys noticed that I was not as 
light-hearted as when I came. McMichael was stead- 
fastly continuing his habit of reading his Bible and pray- 
ing at night before retiring. I knew that other men, 
teachers and students, whom I was learning to love and 
esteem more every day, were doing just as McMichael 
was doing. When trying to study while he was praying 
I began to feel as if I were showing disrespect to them 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 35 

all. I had to yield to the pressure. There came an even- 
ing when I laid aside my books and joined McMichael. 
He and I had not been given to interchange of thought; 
he felt that he was not the one to approach me now. He 
went to Pastor Johnson and told him how my resistance 
in every direction had given way. Perhaps my conver- 
sion had become a solemn responsibility to McMichael. 
His earnestness evidently gave Pastor Johnson a feeling 
that there was something at stake. I had not come to the 
point where I wanted to ask spiritual advice. It was 
brought to me unasked. 

Pastor Johnson was not an hour in delaying. He 
knocked at my door. He found me sitting at my table, 
the Bible open before me, looking sad and troubled. He 
said to me, *1 am glad, Clough, to see you reading your 
Bible ; I hope you are trying to find the way to be saved." 
I admitted that I was reading with anxious enquiry. He 
told me the promises — "Come unto me, all ye that labor, 
and I will give you rest." He prayed with me and urged 
me to pray also. A strong faith in Jesus Christ as my 
Saviour came into my soul. It has never left me. When 
I saw Pastor Johnson again I asked him to baptize me. 
In the First Baptist Church at Burlington I was baptized, 
February ii, 1858. 

During those first weeks after I had entered into Chris- 
tian experience, two men came to my room and told me 
that they believed God had called me to the ministry. 
They went to Pastor Johnson and told him with strong 
feeling their conviction that I must preach the gospel. 
He was amazed, because he had only recently baptized 
me. They wanted him to join them in convincing me of 
my duty. I was holding back, and refused to commit 
myself. 

1 had become poor in spirit. I now became poor in 
pocket. The financial crisis of 1857 swept away the 



36 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

hard-earned money which was to pay for my education. 
It was a hard blow to me. I still had land, but that could 
not help me. I was what was called "land-poor." Finan- 
cial stability was upset during those years preceding the 
war. I was thinking of leaving school and going to 
work again as surveyor, or beginning in a lawyer's office. 
Pastor Johnson heard of the complete loss of all my sav- 
ings. He came to me and said, ^'Brother Clough, do not 
leave school on account of means. Trust God and us. 
Our Education Society will help you." I told him that 
I was filled with doubt and indecision. My call to preach 
had been heard by others more than by me. Neverthe- 
less, it so held me that I felt I must remain and patiently 
plod on even with empty pockets, to get the education 
needed for the ministry. He saw that I wanted to break 
away, find work anywhere, and try to climb up the ladder 
of success without a college education. He urged me 
to stay. 

The Iowa Baptist Education Society never provided 
more than tuition and room rent for me. I might have 
boarded free of charge in the dining-room of the col- 
lege. But I preferred to go half -fed rather than bind 
myself thus to a call of which I was not certain. For 
months I lived there in Burlington on graham bread, a 
little butter and apples. If my health had not been so 
sound my privations would have broken me down physi- 
cally. There were two hundred miles of rough road be- 
tween my mother and me, else she would have sent me 
abundant supplies. I said nothing, but some of the pro- 
fessors were under the impression that I had not enough 
to eat. Professor Marston said to me one day, "Clough, 
I have a little work to do about the house, such as sawing 
wood, and instead of pay maybe you would come and 
take your meals with us regularly." The work was a 
mere excuse invented by Mrs. Marston. For a whole 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 37 

term she thus shielded my pride, in order to make me 
feel free to come and eat with them. 

All my difficulties from first to last in obtaining an 
education in that newly settled state of Iowa no doubt 
had their effect in after years, when, amid great draw- 
backs and opposition, I tried to provide schools of every 
grade for our native Christians in India, and was obliged 
always to reckon with their poverty. If I had had easy 
sailing myself I might have lacked the patience to take 
up that burden in India. 

With regard to my studies also the first year or two in 
Burlington drew heavily upon my faculty for persever- 
ance. On arrival I had to enter the preparatory depart- 
ment and recite with pupils much younger than I. Then 
I worked in advanced classes and carried double studies. 
After about two years I entered the Sophomore year in 
college, and then had only regular college studies. I 
specialized in mathematics. Surveying still had attrac- 
tions for me, and I wanted technical preparation with a 
view to the future. But my funds were low, though I 
worked for good pay on the farm during the summer va- 
cations. Several times I borrowed money from my fam- 
ily. When I entered my Junior year I asked Dr. Allen 
for work. He gave me two classes to teach in the pre- 
paratory department. This brought me an income, but 
it took time and strength. Doing double work in some 
form year after year began to affect my health, but my 
keen interest in athletic sports no doubt helped me retain 
a good measure of physical buoyancy. 

I engaged in the work of the church soon after I was 
baptized. I went into the part of Burlington where the 
factory population lived, and the streets were teeming 
with children. I went among them and invited them to 
come to Sunday school with me. They came, whole 
swarms of them, filling the building, but when the super- 



38 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

intendent tried to divide them into classes they objected, 
and said in that case they would stay away. I was asked 
to preach in a mission in an outlying^ part of Burlington. 
I agreed to do this, and had little anxiety for the outcome, 
for I was considered a fluent speaker in college, and 
especially good at off-hand speeches. I struck out boldly 
in my first sermon, and said all I had prepared to say. 
But after I had preached only fifteen minutes, my mind 
became a blank; I knew of nothing more to say, and 
closed the service. I was vexed with myself, and with 
those who had asked me to preach. I declared that I 
could not and would not become a preacher, and I ad- 
hered to this determination for several years. 

Nevertheless, it was taken for granted in Burlington 
that I would enter the ministry. By a sort of common 
consent I was counted among the "divinity students" of 
the college. Those two men who since the time of my 
baptism were convinced that I was called to preach had 
a firm hold upon me. I did not keep them in ignorance of 
the undercurrent of my doubts. It made no difference to 
them; they were always of the same mind about me. 
They knew that to all appearances my chance for success 
lay in the direction of my own choice of a calling 
in life. But they reasoned with me. I remember on one 
occasion they warned me to cease contending-, lest God 
himself interfere, and my plans of becoming a lawyer, 
a surveyor, or a politician be upset, thus forcing me into 
obedience. I was not in the habit of being afraid — I had 
been facing Sioux Indians and rattlesnakes in the wilder- 
ness too long to be given to fear. But this danger of run- 
ning away from the will of God Almighty concerning 
me was a danger which I was afraid to face. I yielded 
so far as I could. 

There was a good deal of missionary spirit in the Bur- 



I 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 39 

lington church. Two large maps of the missionary world 
were hung one on each side of the pulpit. Pastor John- 
son used to say, "Clough had those to look at." He gave 
a missionary talk once a month. Then he called Dr. S. 
M. Osgood to Burlington for a missionary address. For 
some years a missionary in Burma, he was now district 
secretary in Chicago for the American Baptist Foreign 
Mission Society. On the morning after his address he 
visited several of the young men in their rooms at the 
college, including my own. I was in the same room 
where the chalk marks were proposed, where I was con- 
verted, and where I received the call to the ministry. 
Now Dr. Osgood came in, and bore himself with the 
saintly grace of a messenger, bringing a call to a life's 
service. I felt greatly drawn to him. In later years I 
loved him, and he showed me a father's affection. I 
was reticent ; I did not say much. But when Dr. Osgood 
left my room I felt inwardly committed to become a for- 
eign missionary. 

Meanwhile our nation was hastening toward a crisis. 
The Civil War was on us. The news that Fort Sumter 
had been fired upon acted as an electric shock. Burling- 
ton was close to the Missouri border, slavery and anti- 
slavery sentiment ran in close opposition. From our In- 
stitute windows we had in full view the Mississippi River, 
now dotted with steamers hastening on errands of 
war. We could hear the strains of "Yankee Doodle" 
played on the calliope, and the cheering of volunteers on 
shore. It was impossible to study. Whenever there was 
a new call for volunteers from Abraham Lincoln we held 
meetings. The professors tried to hold us. They closed 
their recitations earlier and talked to us in a sober, mat- 
ter-of-fact way. They told us that more men had already 
enlisted than there were arms with which to supply them. 
They reminded us that we intended to serve God as 



40 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

preachers, teachers, or in some such capacity, and that by 
the time the war was over our country would have need 
of our services. We knew that this was true. Some of 
us heeded the advice. Others broke away. Before the 
end of the school years 1861-62 some classes were entirely 
broken up, others were so small they could not be con- 
tinued; there was no graduating class. The school re- 
ceived a hard blow through the war. 

I went home to my family in Strawberry Point. I was 
now going to enlist. Just then an order went forth 
that further volunteering in Iowa should be stopped. 
Part of the state was sending more than its quota of men, 
part was withholding men.. A draft was insisted upon as 
the only fair way to deal with Iowa. I was not drawn 
into the draft net. The people were singing, "We are 
coming. Father Abraham, five hundred thousand more," 
and I wanted to go — but this evidently was not to be. 

During the long summer vacations spent with my fam- 
ily in Strawberry Point I had become acquainted with 
Miss Harriet Sunderland, and we were engaged to be 
married. She was born in England, came to America 
with her parents when a small child and settled in Chau- 
tauqua County, New York. She had received a good 
primary education, and had attended the high school in 
Jamestown, New York. Her brothers lived in Straw- 
berry Point. She came West and joined them. Only 
twenty-one years of age, she held the position of teacher 
in our little town, and gave evidence of much ability in 
teaching her pupils, about one hundred in number. One 
of her brothers, Jabez Sunderland, was my roommate in 
Burlington for a time. He later became a prominent 
minister in the Unitarian denomination. I also knew her 
brother James Sunderland, who turned to the Baptist 
ministry, and afterward for years served our Foreign 
Mission Society as district secretary on the Pacific 




HARRIET SUNDERLAND CLOUGH (1884) 

"She told me. . . . that she felt greatly drazin to the foreign field. I 
told her of the call to such work which I had received. But we said nothing 
to anyone else about this." 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 4 1 

Coast. His sister, too, had the missionary spirit. She 
told me while we were engaged that she felt greatly- 
drawn to the foreign field. I told her of the call to such 
work which I had received. But we said nothing to any 
one else about this. We were married August 15, 1861. 

At this juncture my family took an interest in my af- 
fairs. Cyrus came to me and told me that they all were 
agreed in several points regarding me. One was that 
they wanted me to stay away from that war; for they 
knew my wholesale fashion of doing things, and were 
afraid of my reckless daring. Another was that they 
were ready to give me substantial backing if I would go 
for my senior year to the Upper Iowa University, which 
had recently been founded at Fayette, only twenty miles 
away. The aid was not to take the form of money, but 
he said if I would settle for the year in Fayette, letting 
our sister Vina be one of our party, they would supply 
us with everything we needed. They would send a 
wagon with furniture, and have a hand in the rent bill. 
Another wagon load was to supply us with wood for 
fuel, and abundant produce of the farm for our cupboard. 
It was a scheme which was kindly meant and was prac- 
ticable. We three students accepted the offer, and our 
family kept their word. 

We had a happy, profitable year. My sister entered the 
regular course and some years later graduated from this 
institution. Mrs. Clough eagerly used the opportunities 
offered her. I joined the senior class. Fayette was a 
quiet place, yet here, too, the war spirit was manifest. 
The students of this institution had as yet stayed to- 
gether. The men were back for the fall term, but there 
was tension. They never knew whether they were com- 
ing to their classes the next day or not. In the spring of 
the year, after Fort Sumter had been fired upon, they had 
formed a company and were ready. Finally nothing 



42 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

could hold them; they left for the seat of war. The 
senior class had numbered nineteen. Only two men were 
left, Mr. Jason L. Paine and myself. We called on the 
professors together to ascertain whether under the cir- 
cumstances they would continue their instruction. It 
was the first graduating class of the institution and it 
was decided that the instruction should be given as if the 
whole class had remained. 

The professors were able men; several of them were 
graduates of Yale University. President Brush took 
President Allen's place in being my friend as well as my 
teacher. Twice a week he let me come to his study and 
recite to him privately on two subjects which I needed to 
complete my course. They were of a philosophical na- 
ture, and the contact with the learned professor without 
the restraint of the classroom was an inspiration. There 
is scope for conjecture as to whether my career would 
have shaped itself differently if the Upper Iowa Univer- 
sity had opened one year earlier, and if I had gone there 
in the first place. Baptist preachers went forth in un- 
usual numbers from Burlington. United States senators 
and men of political career are among the alumni of 
Fayette. For one who intended to be a lawyer and a 
politician it would have seemed the more suitable choice, 
and it is very probable that I would have become a Meth- 
odist under the influences prevailing there. 

The day of graduation came June 26, 1S62, President 
Brush preached the baccalaureate sermon from Romans 
14 :y — "For none of us liveth to himself, and no man 
dieth to himself." Preachers, lawyers, doctors, and many 
who had an interest in the students had come from vari- 
ous parts of upper Iowa in wagons and buggies; for 
there was not yet a railroad. The program of the com- 
mencement exercises was a lengthy one. Mrs. Clough 
participated in the occasion by reading an essay. The 



I 



WORKING THROUGH COLLEGE 43 

subject for my graduating oration was "Skepticism in 
its Relation to Philosophy." 

My college diploma, giving me the degree of Bachelor 
of Arts, was in my hand. But I was now no longer free 
to go forth and use my college education for the career 
which I wanted. I felt bound over in mind and in spirit 
to a career which was not of my choosing. As I look 
back I think it all had to be that way. The Lord 
Jesus was shaping my course, and he makes no mistake. 



IV 



THE CALL OF THE FAR EAST 

In an unsettled frame of mind I now faced the ques- 
tion as to what was to be the next step. The desire to 
go to the war was again uppermost. There was great 
demand for nurses at the front : the wounded were many, 
and those who were there to attend them were over- 
burdened. Mrs. Clough wanted to go with me. Our ap- 
pHcation to the surgeon-general at Washington was 
favorably received. When he learned, however, that 
Mrs. Clough was only twenty-four years of age he re- 
plied that she was too young for duties of so harrowing 
a nature, and declined to entertain the proposition 
further. This was a disappointment to us. 

Then there was the question of my going to a theo- 
logical seminary. I remember that several men urged 
me to make definite preparation for the ministry. But I 
felt no pressure of duty at that time to preach. The only 
call which, to me, had been plain and emphatic was the 
call to the foreign field. It now occupied my mind and 
crowded out the old ambition to become a lawyer. I said 
nothing of this to any one, for I did not feel that the time 
had yet come for me to make a decisive move in that 
direction. : I was waiting for further indications. 

Meanwhile we accepted an offer to teach the public 
school at Colesburg, Iowa, for one year. There were one 
hundred and fifty children. Mrs. Clough presided over 

44 



J 



THE CALL OF THE FAR EAST 45 

the primary department and I had all the rest. The peo- 
ple of this town of about fifteen hundred inhabitants be- 
came greatly attached to us. Our popularity made me 
uneasy; it became a warning" voice to me. Whenever 
there was fresh indication of it the words rang in my ear, 
"Woe unto you when all men shall speak well of you." 
I was followed everywhere by these words, and they were 
powerful enough to make me feel that I was not in the 
right place. I never forgot how it felt. In later years, 
in Ongole, when I knew that there was plotting against 
my life, and when criticism against my work was crop- 
ping up right and left, I told myself that it was better to 
endure this than bear the warning of those words : "Woe 
unto you when all men shall speak well of you.'* 

Once more the temptation came to engage in politics, 
and perhaps take up surveying again. I entered eagerly 
into the contest of electing county and state officers that 
year. The fifteen delegates from Colesburg had made 
me their foreman when we went to the convention called 
by the Republicans of our county. There was intense 
excitement among the one hundred delegates who were 
present, but Colesburg came out ahead. Several Coles- 
burg men were nominated to various county offices, and 
one to a seat in the House of Representatives. Later, 
when the county surveyor was to be nominated, some one 
proposed my name. Then the delegates from the other 
parts of the county rose almost in a body and protested. 
They claimed that through my exertions Colesburg had 
already put men into office in almost everything, and that 
they could not allow any more. I could not work for 
myself. Another man was elected county surveyor. 

Ten years later I was given a key to the understanding 
of that incident in my life. I had been in India and had 
returned to Iowa during my first furlough. During the 
meeting of some association I met Dr. J. Y. Aitchison, 



46 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

a man much respected among the Baptist ministers of the 
state. We were driving together some distance in a 
buggy. He asked me whether I remembered that politi- 
cal convention, and added, "That was a turning point in 
your career." He told me that he was present in that 
convention; he saw how I controlled it, compelling the 
men to do as I advocated. My career in Burlington was 
known to him ; he recognized the temptation that lay in 
my capacity for a political career and feared that I 
would be lost to the ministry. Therefore, as he sat there 
unobserved he prayed with all his might for my defeat. 
He rejoiced when the tide turned against me, and went 
home and gave thanks to God. 

However, this turn in affairs increased my previous 
restlessness. I felt I could not teach school longer. Our 
fourth term was coming to a close; I offered my resig- 
nation to the directors, to take efifect immediately. They 
came in a body and asked me to reconsider, and to name 
the salary I wanted. I told them I must go. The leading 
man among them, who had recently obtained a seat in 
the House of Representatives, largely through my instru- 
mentality, came to me again later and urged me to name 
my salary, but not to go away. He was a good man, a 
Methodist class leader. I felt he would understand my 
motives. I told him about my restlessness, about my 
feeling that I was not in the right place. Tears came into 
the man's eyes. He said, "Mr. Clough, this is of God. 
You will have to go." 

I wrote to my friend, Pastor Johnson, and told him 
that I found myself unable to settle down to work, and 
that I felt no distinct call to anything. He advised me 
to accept an appointment as colporter, and to work at 
this till I found something I really wanted to do in life. 
He, too, had recently made a change. He had become 
district secretary of the American Baptist Publication 



THE CALL OF THE FAR EAST \y 

Society, a position which he held for many years. He 
often spoke of it afterward, that his first official act in 
this position was to get an appointment for me as col- 
porter in northern Iowa, where I was well known. It 
seemed to him always that I made the right move at that 
time. The hand-to-hand labor among the people in 
northern Iowa prepared me for the village visiting in 
India. Books and calling made an excuse for entering 
any home and speaking to any person. I had become 
part of the aggressive Christian force which was at that 
time evangelizing the wide West. No one went with me 
to initiate me. I had printed instructions from the Pub- 
lication Society to guide me in my work. The methods 
here formed were later carried to India. I made it a 
point to hold meetings in farmhouses, to which neighbor- 
ing farmers came. After my first tour through the terri- 
tory assigned to me the people looked forward to those 
meetings. They missed my coming when I resigned to 
go to India. Many said, "What is that for ? We do not 
want you to go. Let some one whom we do not like go 
to those heathen." 

I was happy in my calling as colporter, but I knew all 
the time that I was working my way through a tran- 
sition period. The feeling that the time would come 
when the way would open to go to the foreign field never 
left me. Mrs. Clough had a similar feeling. During 
that year we received what was to us a tempting offer for 
change of service. The principalship of a collegiate in- 
stitute was offered to me at twice the salary which I was 
receiving as colporter. We considered the offer. The 
work would have been far more congenial. We decided 
that we must decline, lest I oppose my sense of duty and 
get into the wrong place again. 

Something now occurred which formed a stepping- 
stone. I heard that Dr. William Dean, the pioneer mis- 



48 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

sionary among the Chinese in Bangkok, Siam, who was 
then in the United States, would address a convention in 
Davenport, Iowa. I went there. I Hstened to Dr. Dean's 
appeal for an assistant. I wanted to go with him. But 
I said nothing to any one, nor did I seek an introduction 
to Dr. Dean. A strange hesitancy held me. I had given 
up my ambition for a career as lawyer and politician and 
surveyor. Yet the steps which I was taking toward the 
call to which I had rendered obedience in secret were 
weak and halting as those of a child. I began now to 
seek counsel with men who had won my confidence. I 
sought to gain strength thereby and found it. 

At some association meeting I met Deacon Giles 
Mabie, inventor of an American reaper. He was travel- 
ing over northern Iowa in behalf of the Iowa Baptist 
Education Society. We decided to go together. While 
driving along tedious roads over the prairies in our buggy 
we talked about many things. The deacon listened to 
my experience of the past five years, which had cul- 
minated in my desire to go to Siam with Dr. Dean. He 
said, "That is all plainly a call from God." He had 
recently been in London and had heard Charles H. Spur- 
geon in the first sudden springing forth of his power as 
a preacher. He was on the alert for something similar in 
my case. It filled him with enthusiasm and I caught it 
from him. He judged of me correctly : I needed more 
self-confidence. He saw that a little honest praise would 
do me good; he even said flattering things to me, and 
they did me no harm. When he went his way, and I 
went mine with my books, my outlook was plainer be- 
fore me, and my courage had risen. The good deacon 
lived to be ninety years old. The tidings from the Telugu 
Mission always stirred him : he felt he had had a hand in 
it. His nephew, Henry C. Mabie, from the time the 
deacon and I rode over the prairies together, heard him 



THE CALL OF THE FAR EAST 49 

speak of me. It formed his first direct contact with 
foreign missions. Thirty years later the nephew and I 
stood side by side in a great work for foreign missions in 
our denomination. 

In my itinerary I went to Dubuque and there met Rev. 
John Fulton, busy purchasing lumber for the church he 
was building in Independence, Iowa. I knew the lumber 
yard where he was picking out his wood, and went there. 
We sat down on a pile of lumber, with the good, strong 
odor of it surrounding us, and talked. He grew enthusi- 
astic. "Why, of course," he said, "that is of God!" He 
was personally acquainted with Dr. Jonah G. Warren, 
secretary of the Baptist Foreign Mission Society, and 
offered to write to him. He did so, and if he failed to 
pick out much lumber for his church that morning he 
helped to pick out a workman for India. I also met 
Elder Asa Chapin, who had been pastor in the East, and 
knew several members of the Executive Committee. The 
two encouraged me, and wrote to the Committee, calling 
their attention to me. The letters written by these men 
formed my introduction to Dr. Warren. He heard of 
me in my humble calling as colporter. It was the begin- 
ning of a strong allegiance that held us till death. 

In order to be in time for the Baptist Anniversaries, 
held in May, 1864, in Philadelphia, I sent to Dr. S. M. 
Osgood, the man who came to my room in college and 
brought me the call to the foreign field, my application 
to be sent to the foreign field as assistant to Dr. Dean. I 
also wrote to Dr. Johnson, the man who baptized me, and 
asked him to give his commendation as my pastor. 
Through these two men my application was sent to Dr. 
Warren, and the matter was laid before the Executive 
Committee. 

While everything was still pending I went to Chicago 
to attend a "Ministers' Institute.'* Many of the ministers 



50 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

then in the West had received little theological training. 
They eagerly came, at least one hundred of them, to this 
Institute every summer to study portions of the Bible and 
attend lectures. The man who presided over it. Dr. Na- 
thaniel Colver, was one of the leading men of the denomi- 
nation. He, too, had not been a student in a theological 
seminary. He was called a giant of Calvinistic faith. I 
came under the spiritual influence of the man during 
those weeks. Of my studies in the Institute I remem- 
bered little afterwards. What remained with me and 
served me was the pattern of such a school. For six 
years, out in India, during the hot weather, I called the 
native preachers together into Ongole, and taught them 
after the pattern given me by Dr. Colver. Thus did I 
train the men who were to be my fellow-workers when- 
thousands were baptized. 

Meanwhile summer had come. It was harvest time, 
and there was great abundance that year. Many of the 
men had gone to the war ; women and children helped in 
the fields, almost day and night. No one could take time 
to look at books or buy them. I took a month's leave 
from colportage and engaged to work in the harvest at 
three dollars per day and board — ^better wages than the 
missionary society offered. I was standing on a four- 
horse reaper, raking off the heavy grain, fifteen acres per 
day, when a man came bringing me a letter from Dr. 
Warren, with an invitation to come to Boston and meet 
the Executive Committee. I left the rich harvest on 
Iowa's farm and turned my face toward the harvest wait- 
ing in India. Only Mrs. Clough and one or two others 
knew why I was going East. I thought I might not be 
accepted. Moreover, if my brothers had known, they 
would have done their utmost to keep me from my pur- 
pose. 

I met the Committee August 2, 1864, sunburned, my 



THE CALL OF THE FAR EAST 5 1 

hands hard and brown with harvesting. I had a slight 
surveyor's stoop. My black alpaca coat was country cut. 
Yet Dr. Warren received me with all kindness, and I felt 
at home with him at once. From the time of my first 
meeting with Dr. Warren I felt that I could do anything 
this man asked of me. Nothing ever changed this feel- 
ing. 

Dr. Warren took me into his room, where he had his 
desk and his papers. There he talked with me for about 
an hour. When I came out of the room I was committed 
in mind to becoming a missionary to the Telugus. I had 
applied to be sent with Dr. Dean to Siam. Another man, 
meanwhile, had filled that place. He died after one year 
on the field. Yet, but for him, I might have been sent to 
Siam. This was evidently not to be. I do not know 
what gave Dr. Warren the idea that I might be a suitable 
man for the Telugu Mission. There were other vacan- 
cies. I had been reading the Baptist Missionary Maga- 
zine for some years, but the Telugu Mission had not 
attracted my attention specially. 

Dr. Warren now told me briefly what its history had 
been. He did this with a touch of personal reminiscence ; 
for he had known every man prominently connected with 
it. Far back, when he was a student in Brown Univer- 
sity, the Rev. Amos Sutton, a missionary of the English 
Baptist Society, occupied the pulpit one Sunday. He 
came from the Oriya country, just north of the Telugu 
country. His wife was an American, the widow of one 
of the missionaries of Judson's party. He urged Ameri- 
can Baptists to found a mission in the Telugu country. 
This was in 1835. His plea was granted. The following 
year the Rev. Samuel S. Day was sent to the Telugus. 

The story of the twenty-eight years which followed was 
a story of much holding on by faith. Only four mis- 
sionaries and their wives had been in service : Day, Van 



52 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Husen, Jewett, Douglass. The society gave two men to 
this mission during the first ten years, one during the 
second decade, and one at the beginning of the third. 
The converts were gathered one by one. The mission 
still had only the one station at Nellore, and a church 
membership of about thirty. 

Three times the question was brought forward at the 
annual meeting of the society, whether this mission 
should be continued or not. These three attempts at 
abandonment were all within the period of Dr. Warren's 
connection with the society — as secretary since 1855. 
No one can measure the spiritual strength with which 
he supported that feeble Telugu Mission, and clung to 
it tenaciously, when others sought to let it die. The 
Baptists had no other mission so forlorn, so nearly given 
up. To this they sent me. 

The third attempt at abandonment had been made just 
recently. Two years before, at the Anniversaries, in 1862, 
there was a majority who believed that abundant time 
had been given the Telugu Mission to show results. 
Since these were not considered adequate there were 
urgent demands that the mission be discontinued. Dr. 
Warren sat on the platform. As he listened while men 
were dealing heavy blows in the work of overthrow he 
said to himself, *'Surely the end of the Telugu Mission 
has come." He had tried to keep silence, but when the 
vote was about to be taken, and he knew it meant death 
to the mission, he could not endure it. He rose and ex- 
claimed, "Wait, brethren, wait! You know not what 
you are doing. Wait, let us hear what Brother Jewett, 
who is now on his journey home, has to say on this sub- 
ject." He said no one afterward could report the speech 
he then made, as it fell from his lips. Neither could he 
himself have told what he said. The mission was saved, 
and he was filled with faith in it. 



THE CALL OF THE FAR EAST 53 

Dr. Warren asked me what I thought about going to 
that mission. I was deeply interested. But I felt right 
there in Dr. Warren's room that it would not be pos- 
sible for me to hold on year after year without visible 
result. I was not a man of faith — action was more in 
my line. I was willing to go out and try. If I found 
that I could not work a change I would make up my mind 
that I was in the wrong place, and must go elsewhere. 
Dr. Warren told me that my active disposition was in 
place. He spoke to me of Dr. Jewett, whom I had not 
yet seen. The foundation for the strong sense of fellow- 
ship in work, which held Dr. Jewett and me for many a 
year, was laid there in Dr. Warren's room. 

I came before the Executive Committee that day, and 
told them of my conversion and my call to the foreign 
field. They asked me whether I felt drawn to any special 
country. I replied, **No, I am ready to go wherever I 
am needed most." I was requested to retire to Dr. War- 
ren's room. A few minutes later Dr. Warren came in 
and said, "Brother Clough, the Executive Committee 
has appointed you a missionary of the American Bap- 
tist Foreign Mission Society, and designated you to the 
Telugus, to work in connection with Dr. Jewett. And 
now can you sleep?" 

Less than two years previously Dr. Jewett, soon after 
his arrival in America, had sat in that room facing the 
Executive Committee. They proposed to him the re- 
linquishment of the Telugu Mission. They found him 
immovable. His faith told him that "God has much peo- 
ple among the Telugus." He had labored among them 
for fourteen years, and declined to be transplanted to 
some other field. He meant to live, and if need be to die, 
among the Telugus. It is said that Dr. Warren smiled 
then and answered, "Well, brother, if you are resolved to 
return, we must send some one with you to bury you. 



54 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

You certainly ought to have a Christian burial in that 
heathen land." 

As I was the man elected to go with Dr. Jewett, they 
wanted to test my mettle. They said to me, "Suppose in 
view of the financial depression, we should have to decide 
not to send you to the Telugus, what would you do?" "I 
should have to find some other way of getting there," 
was my reply. I knew almost nothing about the Telugus. 
I was only dimly aware of the fact that I was being sent 
to a "forlorn hope." Yet I was unwilling to abandon the 
Telugus to whom I had only just been appointed. 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 

When I left Boston after receiving my appointment to 
the Telugu Mission, there was no prospect of an early 
departure to India. Funds were low in the mission treas- 
ury. On account of the war the usual gifts to foreign 
missions were not forthcoming. We were to wait a year. 
I went back to Iowa and stood again on the four-horse 
reaper, pitching off the golden grain, when a telegram 
was brought to me from Dr. Warren. The Committee 
had changed their plans. We were to settle our affairs 
and be ready soon to sail with Dr. Jewett. 

Dr. Warren knew that I wanted to go to a theological 
institution while waiting. He wrote consoling me : "You 
have a collegiate education, and the theological knowl- 
edge which you require you will have time to pick up 
after you reach your station." I have often wondered 
whether to be glad or sorry because I was never a stu- 
dent in a theological seminary. It was not to be, evi- 
dently, in my case. 

My silence was now at an end. My family and friends 
heard of my appointment. My brothers were highly in- 
censed : "You have thrown yourself away ! You must 
be insane." Even my sister Jane felt that her hopes con- 
cerning me were being frustrated. Sister Vina was in 
full sympathy with us. She told us she was coming 
some day to join us. She did come. My father had died 

55 



56 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

two years before. I felt deeply his absence from the old 
homestead. My mother was cheered by having us with 
her during the first years of her widowhood. Mrs. 
Clough, with Allen, our son, born in Colesburg, had 
stayed with her while I was going about as colporter. 
Now we were to leave her. She never objected. When 
the time came for me to go she said, "I am glad I have a 
son thought worthy to be a missionary, but I tell you, 
my boy, it is hard to give you up." She stood in the door 
of the old homestead, quite calm, looking after us as we 
drove away. I turned and looked back several times, and 
never forgot the image of her as she stood there. Sister 
Jane told me many years later that mother, after watch- 
ing till we were out of sight, went out into the dooryard 
and cried so loud, wringing her hands, that her crying 
was heard across the fields over at Cyrus' house. He 
came and tried to bring her in and comfort her, but she 
refused to be comforted. 

At that time, fifty years ago, missionaries were few. 
It was an event in the religious life of a state when some 
one was willing to leave home and go to the other side 
of the earth for Christ's sake. Little was known of 
Asiatic countries and the conditions there. Compared 
with the rapid, comfortable travel of the present day, it 
was a formidable undertaking to go on a voyage of four 
months. 

When the leading Baptists of Iowa heard of our ap- 
pointment and early departure they were stirred. Every- 
body wanted a hand in it. At the state convention, soon 
after, a committee volunteered to help in the outfit, since 
time was so limited. My ordination was to be held in 
the church in Burlington, where I was baptized nearly 
seven years before. A committee of arrangements was 
formed ; Dr. Allen was its chairman. Three weeks before 
the appointed time an invitation was sent ta all the Bap- 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 57 

tist churches in Iowa and neighboring states. It was to 
be a foreign missionary mass meeting; those planning 
to come were to notify the committee of their intention, 
and free accommodation was to be offered to all who 
thus came. It lasted two days, November 19 and 20, 
1864. On the first day was my examination, and in the 
evening a missionary sermon from Dr. Nathaniel Colver. 
On the next day, a Sunday, was the ordination service, 
followed in the evening by a missionary conference. 

An able council came to the ordination. I was fully 
aware of my lack of theological training, but determined 
to tell the council what I knew. There was present Dr. 
Allen, the teacher and friend of my college days; Dr. 
Osgood, who had brought me the call to the foreign field ; 
Dr. Aitchison, who sat in the political convention a little 
more than a year before. There was Dr. Nash of Des 
Moines, Iowa, and Dr. J. A. Smith of the Standard of 
Chicago; and there was Dr. Nathaniel Colver, the great 
Baptist preacher, who knew better than any one else there 
that they were sending me to a "forlorn hope," for twice 
— ^perhaps three times — he had been at the anniversary 
meetings when the fate of the Telugu Mission hung in 
the balance, and it was saved. 

Dr. G. J. Johnson had come from St. Louis to be pres- 
ent at the ordination of his "son in the faith." He gave 
me the hand of fellowship. Long years after he told me 
that this was a great moment in his life. Fifteen years 
had passed since his own ordination. Even as a student 
he had felt the call to the foreign field. He always wanted 
to go, but circumstances prevented him. The doubt 
made him restless. Now, as he stood on the platform 
during my ordination, it came to him almost as a voice 
from heaven : "He has gone in your stead ; you are re- 
leased !" Never again did he have a disquieting thought ; 
his duty seemed to be fulfilled through me. 



$S SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Before the service was over a telegram came from Dr. 
Warren asking Dr. Allen to send us on at once. We 
decided that we must take the first eastbound train 
early the next morning. Our outfit, prepared by the Bap- 
tist churches in Iowa, was nearly ready to be packed. It 
had to be left behind. The Mississippi was running with 
floating ice. There was no bridge. If the ice were to 
close there would be no way of crossing. Early the next 
morning we took the ferry boat. It was cold, and there 
was some risk, but a number of friends and brethren were 
there to cross with us, and see us off at the railway sta- 
tion. The Baptists in Iowa sent us to India with warm 
hearts. They did not cease to stand by me during my 
missionary life. 

We arrived in Chicago in the evening. Dr. Colver and 
Dr. Osgood had come with us. We had only an hour to 
wait for our train, and were then to go on alone. One of 
the most important events of my life now happened. The 
presence of those two men of God with us all day had 
seemed to bring us to a Mount of Transfiguration as we 
talked together. Our train was ready. Dr. Osgood had 
placed Mrs. Clough and Allen on board. Dr. Colver 
and I stood outside near the steps. The first gong had 
sounded; it was nearly time for the next. Then, as if 
moved by some powerful impulse, Dr. Colver took both 
my hands in his. In his impressive way he said, "Brother 
Clough, I believe that God from all eternity has chosen 
you to be a missionary to the Telugus. Go nothing 
doubting. Remember that you are invulnerable until 
your work is done." With this he handed me up the 
steps, the train started, and we were off. I had received 
a benediction that was far more than a benediction. The 
strong feeling which I was to cherish for many years, that 
I was an ambassador of Jesus Christ to the Telugus, was 
here born into conscious conviction. The assurance that 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 59 

I was invulnerable until my work was done stayed by 
me, all through, like a sword of fire. It was a spiritual 
anointing given by one who had the power to give it. 
It was received in all humility. The effect remained. 

We had only two days in which to reach Boston. A 
heavy snowstorm in western New York delayed us. 
Trains were not on time. When finally we arrived in 
Boston, Dr. Warren stood there waiting for us. I asked 
hurriedly, "Is the ship here yet?" Answer: "The crew 
ran away last night, and are not back yet, hence you are 
safe at least another day." Shipping was disorganized 
by the war. Men wanted to enlist. Our ship was a mile 
from shore. When the crew began to come back police- 
men watched every boat that went to it, to keep the crew 
from running away again. Portions of our outfit ar- 
rived by express. The rest reached us in India. 

We now met Dr. Jewett. He had to leave wife and 
children behind and go out alone. The farewell meeting 
in Tremont Temple was held in a small audience room, 
and even that was not full. The war occupied the minds 
of people. Besides, we were going to a "forlorn hope," 
a mission that had nearly been given up. The time to sail 
was set several times. Finally, on November 30, 1864, 
the James Guthrie weighed anchor, not to touch shore 
again for nearly four months. 

Few ships sailed to India at that time. We were in 
some danger. Ours was a northern ship, and our cap- 
tain had reason to fear the Alabama, the famous south- 
ern privateer. Whenever a ship came in sight he hoisted 
the Union Jack instead of the American flag. I ventured 
to remonstrate against this sailing under false colors, to 
which he replied, "Would you rather have Captain 
Semmes come and run out a plank and ask you to walk 
out on it?" He was a Swede, and did not sympathize 
with me when I told him I was an American, who did not 



60 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

fear Captain Semmes or the whole Confederacy but 
wanted to sail under true colors. 

Our hardships on this voyage were many. It was a 
ship of eight hundred tons, loaded with ice, lumber, and 
apples. We were the only passengers. The supplies on 
board were wholly inadequate. We ate corn meal mush 
and molasses mostly, and were glad the potatoes held out. 
The captain was not sufficiently in sympathy with us to 
seek our comfort. 

Time dragged heavily. I had a number of books of a 
theological nature with me, and was reading them. Dr. 
Jewett and I held preaching services for the sailors, and 
the men were interested in the tracts I gave them. Mrs. 
Clough, though often not well, sang hymns at our meet- 
ings, to which we all were glad to listen. My diary tells 
of a morning, early, when the captain called me on deck. 
One of the men had fallen from the main top yard, and 
lay there with bones broken. We had to set them and put 
him in his bunk. This increased the gloom. When near- 
ing Ceylon we were overtaken by a severe cyclone. For 
several hours it seemed as if our ship was not of a kind 
or size to weather the storm. But we came through. 

We gave an account of our hardships in our first letters 
to Boston. It grieved Dr. Warren. He wrote us a joint 
letter in which he said : 

"Your dreadful protracted sufferings cannot be avoided, 
they cannot be alleviated ; would that they could be. May 
we all be admonished to constant vigilance lest others suffer 
in like manner. I feel for you all; my deepest, tenderest 
sympathy is moved for Mrs. Clough and the little boy. 
My heart has ached for them, and now it would be a relief 
if I could bear part of the pang." 

Many an hour Dr. Jewett and I sat on deck together, 
busy with our thoughts. Sometimes we fell to talking. 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 6l 

Our main topic was the Telugu Mission. Dr. Jewett 
never wearied of this. I was an eager listener. My ap- 
pointment and early departure had been so sudden that 
I needed to adjust myself and to learn something of the 
mission to which I was going. I took the first lessons in 
my apprenticeship. Mr. Day had thus told Dr. Jewett 
what had been done during the first twelve years of the 
mission. He now passed this on to me, and with it all 
that lay within the sixteen years of his own experience.- 
Later I formed a link with the past to many a new man ; 
for I loved to talk of the old days. 

I always had a good deal of respect for Rev. Samuel 
S. Day, the founder of our mission. He was at home in 
Canada at this time. I never met him. A man of perse- 
verance, with a level head, faith in God, and faith in the 
work given him to do, he had the qualities that go to 
make the founder of an enterprise. His choice of Nel- 
lore as the first station of our mission could not have 
been better. It formed a good' basis for operations. He 
decided on this in 1840 after working in several other 
places for four years. Scarcely had Mr. Day settled in 
Nellore when he began to look in the direction of Ongole, 
a town seventy-four miles directly north of Nellore, and 
as yet wholly unoccupied by missionary enterprise. He 
went there on tour in 1841, and when he returned he said 
to his wife, "Ongole will in time make the great center 
of our mission, if only we can occupy it." She remem- 
bered it, and afterward told her children about it. Dur- 
ing those early years another mission, further north, 
was founded. Ongole was about midway between the 
two missions. One cool season the tw^o founders of the 
two missions met while touring. They pitched their 
tents together and exchanged neighborly courtesies. In 
talking of many things connected with their work they 
also discussed the occupancy of Ongole. Both founders 



62 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

wanted it. Mr. Day had been there first and had prac- 
tically occupied it as an outstation of Nellore. He quietly 
insisted he must keep Ongole. The other man gave in; 
he said, "There are other places; if you Baptists want 
to begin a mission here I will go elsewhere." If Mr. Day 
had taken a different course, and had extended his work 
in another direction, the whole subsequent history of our 
mission would have been changed. Knowing how he 
had laid the foundations, no wonder that he could not 
give up the Telugu Mission. 

After ten years of labor the time came for Mr. Day to 
go to America with his family. Only one man had been 
sent to join him in his labors. Rev. S. Van Husen, in 
1840. After five years, broken in health, he and his wife 
returned to America. When now Mr. Day had to 
leave the field there was no one to take his place. He 
placed responsibility upon two Eurasians, to keep up the 
Sunday services, to care for the schools, and teach in- 
quirers. They had done good service while he was there 
to direct them. They soon proved untrustworthy. All 
that had been built up was laid waste. Those two years, 
1846-8, were the darkest years in all the history of 
the mission. And those were the years when the priva- 
tions of the pioneer life of my parents pressed me sorely. 
The lack of opportunities made life dark to me. In look- 
ing back it seems the Telugu Mission and I kept pace 
together. Born in the same year, oppressed by poverty 
during the same years, prosperous together, making de- 
cisive moves at the same time — our lives were knit to- 
gether from the beginning. 

After two years in America, with health restored, Mr. 
Day asked to be sent back to India. Rev. Lyman Jewett 
was under appointment, and was to go with him. At the 
annual meeting of 1848 the question was raised why this 
feeble mission should be continued — why not send these 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 63 

two men to some other more promising field ? Mr. Day 
plead for the life of his mission. He knew his flock was 
scattered, and sorrow awaited him in leaving his wife and 
children behind in America. Nevertheless, he begged to 
be sent back. One of the great men of the denomination 
came forward and helped him. -Dr. William R. Williams 
brought in a report for the committee to which this ques- 
tion had been referred. It had for its keynote: "De- 
stroy it not, for a blessing is in it." He was one of the 
first to strike the prophetic note on behalf of the Telugu 
Mission which afterwards became characteristic. 

Dr. Jewett told me he sat during that meeting and lis- 
tened as if his own fate were in the balance. He and 
Mrs. Jewett went out with Mr. Day. With steady hearts 
they took hold. There had been real converts in Nel- 
lore, though few in number. They came when Mr. Day 
called them back. But it was a sad state of affairs, and 
often the Jewetts heard Mr. Day in the solitude of his 
own room praying aloud for the Telugu Mission, and 
sometimes words ceased and there were groans as if in 
travail of soul. Five years more he held out, and then, 
with health permanently impaired, he returned to 
America. 

Now the Jewetts stood alone. Mr. Day had been gone 
only a few months, when letters came around the Cape, 
telling the Jewetts that an order had almost gone forth 
to them to sell the bungalow, say farewell to the little 
group of Christians in Nellore and move across to Burma 
to work there. A friend wrote, *Tf the society gives up 
the mission, what field shall you take up, Jewett?" He 
replied, "Then Lyman Jewett will stay and work by him- 
self with the Telugus." 

A deputation of two men had recently visited the Asi- 
atic missions. They had come to Nellore and had re- 
ceived an impression unfavorable to the continuance of 



64 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

the mission. Therefore they recommended to the so- 
ciety that the Telugu Mission be closed and the Burma 
missions be thereby enlarged. The Baptists at that time 
had few missions, but those few were cherished. None 
had made so deep an impression upon the minds of the 
people as the missions in B.urma. The story of Adoniram 
Judson had touched all hearts. As the years passed, and 
the Telugu Mission continued to give no evidence of spe- 
cial divine favor, the question continually rose to the 
surface : Why not abandon this, and concentrate where 
success is certain? 

A crucial time had now come. At the annual meeting 
in Albany, May, 1853, the report of the deputation was 
received. Preliminary work had been done by the Board. 
A committee to whom the subject was intrusted recom- 
mended that the Telugu Mission be continued and re- 
enforced. It was the demand of the hour that the subject 
be laid before the society then in session. Part of one 
evening was given to discussion. Men wanted oppor- 
tunity to speak for or against. It was taken up again 
the next morning and concluded in a way wholly beyond 
the ordinary. Dr. Jewett treasured everything he had 
heard or read about this meeting like so much sacred his- 
tory. As he told me about it there on that ship, it stirred 
me greatly. 

Dr. Edward Bright, in a powerful address, described 
how the little group of church members at Nellore would 
feel when they learned that American Baptists had aban- 
doned them. He was the one who would have to write 
the letter to them : it was something he did not care to 
face. He walked up and down the platform reiterating 
the question, "And who shall write the letter?" 

A large map of Baptist missions was hanging over 
the pulpit. On one side of the Bay of Bengal was a 
thick cluster of stars, representing mission stations in 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 65 

Burma. On the other side was just one star, indicating 
the Nellore station in the Telugu country. Some one in 
the heat of argument pointed to it and called it a "Lone 
Star." There was one in that audience who was touched 
by the expression "Lone Star." He was the man who 
gave to the American people their national anthem, "My 
Country, Tis of Thee" : Dr. S. F. Smith. Next morning 
at his breakfast table Judge Ira Harris asked Dr. Smith's 
opinion about the question to be decided at the meeting of 
that morning. He took a slip of paper out of his pocket, 
on which he had written a poem overnight, and said, 
"You have it here." 

Judge Harris kept the slip of paper. During the dis- 
cussion of the morning, while the fate of the Telugu Mis- 
sion was hanging in the balance, he read the six stanzas 
to the assemblage with thrilling effect. It was the famous 
"Lone Star" poem. 

Shine on, "Lone Star !" Thy radiance bright 
Shall spread o'er all the eastern sky; 

Morn breaks apace from gloom and night; 
Shine on, and bless the pilgrim's eye. 

Shine on, "Lone Star!" I would not dim 
The light that gleams with dubious ray; 

The lonely star of Bethlehem 
Led on a bright and glorious day. 

Shine on, "Lone Star !" in grief and tears, 
. And sad reverses oft baptized; 
Shine on amid thy sister spheres; 
Lone stars in heaven are not despised. 

Shine on, "Lone Star!" Who lifts his hand 

To dash to earth so bright a gem, 
A new "lost pleiad" from the band 

That sparkles in night's diadem? 



66 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Shine on, **Lone Star !" The day draws near 
When none shall shine more fair than thou ; 

Thou, born and nursed in doubt and fear, 
Wilt glitter on Immanuel's brow. 

Shine on, "Lone Star!" till earth redeemed, 

In dust shall bid its idols fall; 
And thousands, where thy radiance beamed, 

Shall "crown the Saviour Lord of all." 

Those who were present said there was that in the 
lines, and in the impressive way in which they were read, 
that shook the audience, already strung to a high pitch. 
Many wept. The Baptists could not have endured it if 
their Telugu Mission had been abandoned. It was saved. 
Long years after men marveled at this meeting. The 
large audience was swayed as by a prophetic impulse. 
They seemed to have forgotten that they were debating 
the fate of one little mission station. If they had seen 
before their eyes the multitude pressing into the Kingdom 
in that Telugu Mission in years to come they could not 
have been more deeply concerned. Dr. Jewett carried a 
clipping of the "Lone Star" poem around with him in his 
pocket wherever he went. It was an anchor to his faith. 
He showed it to me. He had cut it out of a New York 
paper, that came to him in India, bringing a report of 
that meeting. It was at that time a piece of forgotten 
history, but he cherished it. 

In our talks Dr. Jewett often referred to Ongole. That 
place had been to him as the apple of his eye. He had a 
compound there, and a bungalow, all waiting, year after 
year, for one who should labor there. During his so- 
journs at Ongole he had often noticed a piece of land, lo- 
cated close to the town, yet a little to one side. It seemed 
to him just right for a mission compound. The ruins of a 
bungalow were there. It had been the club of a regi- 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA (yj 

ment stationed at Ongole during the time of the East 
India Company. The years had passed, and then there 
came a time when the place was made habitable. A sub- 
judge of Ongole, who could command the resources of 
the place, wanted to build at small expense. He pro- 
cured the services of a gang of prisoners to clear away 
the cactus, grown man-high, which covered the eleven 
acres of land. He received permission to take the stone 
from the fort of the Ongole rajah, recently deposed, for 
building material. Some teak timber, floated over from 
Burma, had been found lying on the beach ten miles 
away. It furnished wood for doors and windows. He 
now built on the ruins of the old club house. It cost him 
little more than the labor. The sub judge lived there, 
but was likely to be transferred at any time. Dr. Jewett 
wondered how to get hold of this property. 

He was on friendly terms with the English officials at 
Ongole, and often, when they came to Nellore, they called 
on the Jewetts, and took a cup of tea with them. During 
a visit of that kind Dr. Jewett told one of them that he 
wanted that property for his mission. The man soon 
took steps to help him. The subjudge was leaving and 
sold it for 1,500 rupees to the English magistrate. He 
now sold it to Dr. Jewett's caller, who lost no time in 
offering it to the mission at the original low rate. 

Meanwhile Dr. Jewett had written to Dr. Warren and 
asked for an appropriation for the house. It could not 
be granted. But Dr. Warren added a postscript : "Keep 
your eye on that house, and remember that you have a 
friend in the Indian territory." The Jewetts hired money 
from the bazaar at interest and gave their note for the 
rest. The house was theirs, bought with borrowed 
money. Dr. Jewett now wrote to his school friend be- 
yond the Mississippi. He replied, "My dear brother, I 
had some of the Lord's money in my hands. I had not 



68 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

read more than three lines of your letter before I knew 
what to do with it. You asked for seven hundred and 
fifty dollars. I send you nine hundred and fifty." 

That man, Reuben Wright, was a powerful factor in 
those early days of the Telugu Mission. Wholly in the 
background, he nevertheless furnished "the sinews of 
war." Years before, too poor to continue at school in 
Boston, he went to the Far West and made much money. 
On a visit to Boston he attended revival meetings. He 
began to feel that he must save his soul by giving his 
money. Some one took him to Dr. Warren. He said he 
wanted to support a missionary. Dr. AVarren read him 
a list of names. He came to Lyman Jewett. The man 
stopped him, and repeated the name several times, and 
added, "I remember his prayers when we were at school 
together. Yes, I will take him." Year after year he paid 
Dr. Jewett's salary into the treasury. He paid for mis- 
sion property. He was interested in Mrs. Jewett's 
schools. When at all times Dr. Jewett refused stead- 
fastly to abandon the Telugu Mission his confidence was 
upheld by the friend God had given him. There was 
hard cash there, and with it the faith of the man who 
gave it, and of the man and the woman who were doing 
the holding on, tenaciously. 

I listened to these stories with deep interest. I felt 
their power. Then one day Dr. Jewett told me of an ex- 
perience which came to him in connection with Ongole. 
It afterwards became a story told hundreds of times in 
missionary meetings and in print. At that time Dr. 
Jewett kept it hidden in his own heart. As yet there was 
no fulfillment. Perhaps he began to wonder whether it 
did not concern me. It happened a few months after 
he heard of the Albany meeting. He was in a frame of 
mind for a spiritual uplifting. With wife and children 
he had gone to Ongole on a lengthy preaching tour. The 




" . . . They proposed 
to him the relinquishment 
of the Telugu Mission. 
They found him immov- 
able. His faith told him 
that 'God has much people 
among the Telugus.' " 



LYMAN JEWETT, D.D. 




" . . . He left the hill 
strongly convinced that the 
man for Ongole vi.<as coming. 
. . . I had wanted to be- 
come a lawyer and a poli- 
tician .... Did that hill- 
top meeting offer any solu- 
tion to these peculiar rever- 
sals in my lifcf . . " 



PRAYER MEETING HILL 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 69 

end of the year had come. There were some low hills, 
close to Ongole. They decided to go up on one of these 
hilltops to pray, early the first morning of the new year, 
1854. They were five in number. Dr. and Mrs. Jewett, 
Nursu, one of the first regular preachers in the mission, 
Julia, the first fruit of Mrs. Jewett's school, and Ruth, 
another of the early helpers. They sang together; they 
prayed together, one after another. Dr. Jewett stood 
up and looked over the plain before him, dotted with 
villages, perhaps fifty of them in full sight, in the radi- 
ance of the dawn. He said, **As the sun is now about 
to rise and shine upon the earth, so may the Sun of 
Righteousness arise quickly and shine upon this dark 
land.'^ He pointed to that piece of ground, all overgrown 
with cactus, and asked, **Would you not like that spot 
for our mission bungalow, and all this land to become 
Christian? Well, Nursu, Julia, that day will come." It 
was seven years after that time that the mission property 
came into his possession. 

The burden on his heart, as he stood on that hilltop, 
was the man for Ongole. He told me that by the time he 
left the hill he felt strongly convinced within himself 
that the man was coming. I confess that this stirred me. 
I did not know whether I was that man. No one, as yet, 
had said so. I reckoned back. At the time of the meet- 
ing in Albany the surveyors came and took me out of my 
father's house at a few hours' notice. At the time of 
that hilltop meeting I was making my first attempt to get 
an education. It was still fresh in my memory how I 
had wanted to become a lawyer and a politician, and was 
always thwarted in this, and made to go in a direction 
which was not of my own choosing. Did that hilltop 
meeting offer any solution to these peculiar reversals in 
my life? The thought filled my mind. In my letters of 
the first years in India I often spoke of the "Lone Star" 



yO SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Mission ; I referred to *Trayer Meeting Hill," as I called 
it. Back there, on that old sailing vessel, with nothing 
else to think about, my energies all pent up, I began to 
wheel myself into line. I breathed an atmosphere of 
faith and expectancy. With all my heart I was ready to 
go to work and see some of those hopes realized. 

Our ship, after rounding the Cape, came at last in 
sight of Ceylon. On a Sunday morning we sighted 
Madras. The captain had heard me say I hoped we 
would not land on a Sunday. When now we were be- 
calmed as we neared the harbor, very difficult of approach 
at that time, he feared we would drift ashore, and grew 
excited. He attributed the, calm to me, and used some 
very bad language about missionaries, and declared it 
was the last company he would ever have on a ship of 
his. His ire subsided when a breeze came and wafted 
us into harbor just as the sun was setting. Some fisher- 
men came alongside the ship on catamarans with fish for 
sale. They were repulsive in appearance. These were 
the first human beings we had seen, except at a long dis- 
tance, for one hundred and nine days. The contrast was 
between Boston and all that that meant to us and the 
Hindus, according to their representatives before us. I 
confess that I was heart-sick. My enthusiasm was greatly 
checked, and for a time I more than half wished myself 
back in America. 

The next morning, March 26, 1865, a note was 
brought on board from a friend of Dr. Jewett, inviting 
us to come to his house. His carriage was waiting for 
us at the beach. The house was decorated with Ameri- 
can flags, and a good breakfast was waiting for us. We 
were safely landed. 

We tarried in Madras three weeks, and then made the 
journey of one hundred and eight miles to Nellore in 



AROUND THE CAPE TO INDIA 7 1 

slow stages. We went in bullock carts, at the rate of 
thirty miles a night, staying during the heat of the day in 
the rest houses at intervals along the road. We arrived 
in Nellore April 22, 1865, in the midst of the hot season, 
and received a glad welcome from the native Christians. 



VI 

MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 

Nellore was at this time a town of about 26,000 
inhabitants, a center of trade and travel, and the head- 
quarters of the' chief officials of the Nellore district. 
The mission compound with its shade trees and flowering 
shrubs was situated on a frequented road on the out- 
skirts of the town. Many who passed that way looked 
into the thatch-covered chapel close to the road, and 
stayed a while to learn about the new religion. 

There was a good, substantial mission bungalow, built 
by Mr. Day in 184 1. It had been the home of the Jewetts 
since 1848. Rev. F. A. Douglass and his wife had joined 
them in 1855. They were now the occupants, and were 
waiting for our arrival, so that with their children they 
might sail for America after ten years of service. This 
bungalow became our home, shared with Dr. Jewett. 
Mrs. Clough and I eagerly entered into the life and work 
of this mission station. We soon felt an interest in the 
native Christians, who were thirty in number. There 
were inquirers, people who came and went. Children 
had been gathered into the school; the promising ones 
among them were watched over with much care, in the 
hope that they would become useful workers in the mis- 
sion. We put our shoulder to the load, ready to carry 
our share. 

At that time little was known of the Oriental races. 

72 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 73 

Christian people took it for granted that the older relig- 
ions were wholly bad, and that their scriptures contained 
nothing but evil. There was no sympathetic approach, 
no feeling that perhaps God had not left himself unre- 
vealed to the heathen world. It distressed many thought- 
ful men and women in Christian lands to think that the 
rest of the world was given over to sin, and that unless 
the heathen heard the gospel of Jesus Christ, and accepted 
it, they would be eternally lost. This was my opinion, too, 
when I went to India. It formed my missionary motive. 
I looked upon the Hindus as simply heathen ; I wanted to 
see them converted. As the years passed I grew tolerant 
and often told the caste people, if they could not, or 
would not, receive Jesus Christ as their Saviour, to serve 
their own gods faithfully. During my visits to America 
I sometimes told American audiences that the Hindus 
were in some respects better than they. I told them to 
wake up, and be true Christians, or else the Hindus 
would come over to America and try to convert the 
Americans. 

During our stay in Madras after our arrival I was 
deeply interested in the missionary situation there. A 
number of societies had planted a mission in this large 
city, with its teeming population, speaking several lan- 
guages. Dr. Jewett knew the group of missionaries in 
Madras. We were received with much brotherly spirit. 
Men who were afterwards the seniors in their societies 
were here, still young, busy forming methods. Some 
were engaged in educational work. Once more I was 
tempted to turn away from preaching. A large institu- 
tion with six hundred students was without a principal. 
I was asked whether I would consider an offer favorably ; 
it would then be made officially. I told them No, I could 
not stay. It was partly loyalty to my society, partly my 
feeling that I must preach. 



74 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Though I wanted to become an evangelistic missionary, 
I saw no reason why I should not write books and make 
translations and do the work of a scholar in the intervals 
of preaching. I tried it. I sat over my books, and gave 
half an ear to inquirers who came. I made up my mind 
that I must give this up. I wanted to preach, and decided 
to do it with all my heart and all my strength. 

In that formative period of my missionary career I was 
full of enthusiasm. Those who knew me then say I dis- 
played the greatest faith in expecting the Hindus to 
leave their gods and come to Christ. In my prayers I 
asked that the whole Telugu country might be converted. 
I talked of schemes for converting the people in large 
numbers. If difficulties were pointed out to me I made 
light of them. I believed the Hindu religion must be 
attacked boldly, and thought the older missionaries had 
not done this. Existing missionary methods seemed too 
slow. I wanted to work a change — to strike out on inde- 
pendent lines. Perhaps that was the attitude which the 
Lord Jesus wanted me to have. All my schemes and 
plans were knocked over when he sent me the Pariahs 
in large numbers — after that my methods were made for 
me. All I did then was to follow and trust the Lord 
Jesus to help me and show me what to do. 

I learned much from Dr. Jewett, and was willing to be 
guided by him as my teacher. In later years, when 
young men were coming and going in Ongole, learning 
the ways of missionary life, I sometimes told them that 
during my apprenticeship I did everything Dr. Jewett 
told me to do. They laughed at me for this, and said 
they had no doubt I tried hard enough, but perhaps with 
indifferent success. It is true, however, that Dr. Jewett 
taught me the missionary methods which were in general 
practice at that time. I never wholly set them aside. 
The movement among the Madigas only added new meth- 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 75 

ods, which I was bound to follow, lest I hinder the devel- 
opment. 

During the first months in Nellore I was much with 
Dr. Jewett. I watched his ways of dealing with the na- 
tive people. They were beautiful, fatherly ways. The 
people loved him. He was eminently meek and gentle 
and kind. I was not meek by nature. That I had him 
before me as a pattern during that year and a half of 
my apprenticeship was one of the blessings of my mis- 
sionary life. He sometimes said to me, "li we two could 
have been mixed together and then divided into halves it 
would have been better for us both." He with his meek- 
ness was at one extreme, I with my somewhat fiery dis- 
position was at the other extreme. The Telugu Mission 
had need of us both. 

His devotion to his Master, Jesus, was very great. It 
is one of the stories still told about him among the de- 
scendants of those who knew him, that one day, when he 
was preaching in the bazaar to a group of people, a young 
Mohammedan took a handful of sand, threw it at him, 
and ran away. He brushed the sand away, and beckoned 
to the young man, "Come back, I want to tell you about 
Jesus." I suppose this story is true, but it is equally 
true that if I had been there that young fellow would 
have run much faster and farther than he did. I loved 
Dr. Jewett; I could not have allowed any disrespect to 
him, not even for the sake of his message. One day 
in those early months in Nellore, we went to the riverside 
together. People came there toward evening, and he 
found an audience. A young man began to dance and 
laugh and clap his hands, trying to disturb Dr. Jewett. 
I soon could stand no more of that. I walked up near 
to that fellow, and next he found himself in the river, 
shallow in that place, but the cool water made him sober. 

I worked hard all day, learning the Telugu language. 



^6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

My teacher was a Christian young man who wanted to 
become a preacher. I therefore taught him an hour every 
day in Dr. Alvah Hovey's book of theology. When the 
sun began to go down we put our books aside and went 
for long walks. I had my eyes open then; for it is as 
necessary to learn the people as it is to learn their lan- 
guage. I began to talk with those we met, learning to 
form sentences, and the replies began to sound familiar. 
There were places to which we went frequently. People 
soon knew us and looked for us. One of these preaching- 
places was where four or five roads met. After a time I 
noticed that when people came within a certain distance 
of me they held their hands to their ears and ran. I said 
to my teacher, "Why are they doing thus ?" He replied, 
"They believe you are a man sent from God. If they 
hear your message they will be held accountable. There- 
fore they close their ears and run that they may be as if 
they had not heard." 

There was a hamlet near Nellore to which we went 
often. The place where we stood and talked with the 
people was close to the house of a Mala priest, Tupili 
Lutchmiah, who went with his idols to thirty villages, 
round about, and conducted worship. He was prosper- 
ous as a priest. Out of curiosity he came to hear what 
we had to say. Then he grew angry; he found himself 
believing and realized that the foundations of his life 
were tottering. He shut the door of his house and told 
his wife not to listen to us. Then, one day, he told me 
he wanted to be a Christian, and asked me what he must 
do to be saved. I talked with him till dark, and then at 
his request left a colporter with him to pray. Two hours 
later he sent me word to give thanks to God on his be- 
half, for he had found the Saviour. This man was the 
first fruit of my labor in India. He was baptized Decem- 
ber 24, 1865. 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS ^y 

Now trouble began. The people to whom he had gone 
with his idols to conduct worship feared that without his 
ceremonies and invocations calamities would come upon 
them; their cattle would die; their crops would wither. 
Since he himself was lost to them, they demanded the 
idols. He was afraid they would mob his house and 
take them by force. He brought them to me to keep 
where no one could worship them. Then we were in 
danger. The head of the police force heard of this. He 
offered to send a constable to guard us. I thought this 
unnecessary, but took his advice and stayed in the house 
after dark. The trouble passed. 

The habits of my life as colporter in Iowa were strong 
upon me. I had to adjust myself to the fact that I was 
now working in a country where few could read, outside 
that privileged class, the Brahmans. I did not wait until 
I had a grammatical knowledge of the Telugu language. 
I learned by heart in Telugu the verse, "God so loved the 
world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoso- 
ever believeth on him should not perish but have ever- 
lasting life." With this verse I went out into the streets 
of Nellore, before I could say anything else, and wher- 
ever I could get a native to stand still and listen to me I 
told him this verse. I was continually distributing tracts. 
If a man told me, "I cannot read," I asked him to go to 
some one who could, and for a small copper coin get the 
tract read which I was holding out to him. Tracts be- 
came common in Nellore. The merchants used them for 
wrapping paper when small quantities of spices were re- 
quired. Pieces of tracts thus found entrance into Nel- 
lore homes otherwise closed. Some of those tracts hit 
the mark : men were saved. 

Soon I began to want a tract that would tell the people 
my message in my own words. With my Telugu teacher 
always at hand, ready to cooperate with me, I wrote one 



yS SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

entitled ''Where are You Going?" It was direct in its 
language, and was a sermon in a nut-shell. Then I 
worked on a larger tract, really a booklet, "Messages for 
All." It was not completed till after I had settled in 
Ongole. This became practically the text-book in the 
movement among the Madigas. I had brought into it a 
collection of Bible verses on the different phases of Chris- 
tian experience. I tried to put the whole gospel into it. 
If a man comprehended the verses, one after another, in 
that little book, he knew enough of the truth as it is in 
Jesus Christ to be saved. In the years that followed, 
many editions of these tracts were printed, thousands 
at a time. They did a great work in being tools in the 
hands of our preachers and teachers. 

There was a large temple in Nellore. The time came 
for the annual temple festival. People from the villages 
outside of Nellore were coming to celebrate. Everyone 
was in a frame of mind to forget for a short time the 
daily pursuits and engage in religious observances. I 
had one thousand copies of my tract, "Where are You 
Going?" ready for the occasion. During the days of the 
festival I took my place on a pile of stones lying on a 
street where the people were passing in throngs. All 
were talking, full of excitement, moving along ready to 
be interested in all they saw. I made myself heard above 
the din of voices, as I shouted to them to take one of the 
tracts I was holding in my hands. One thousand of them 
were given away, one by one, into the hands of the 
people during the days of that festival. There were con- 
versions afterwards. This was a method of reaching peo- 
ple much in use at that time. The missionaries in north- 
ern India, especially, employed it. The appeal made at a 
time when the people were in a responsive mood, ready 
to be swayed by religious impulses, was often effective. 
But it reached their hearts while away from home, de- 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 79 

tached from their accustomed surroundings. The move- 
ment among- the Madigas taught me to take the people 
in their villages, and to Christianize the village. 

It was my custom to go out to one of the hamlets of 
Nellore every Sunday afternoon. I could talk with the 
people a little, but I could not yet preach. One of the 
regular preachers of the mission went with me. We se- 
lected a central place in the hamlet, where there was 
shade, and invited the people to come out of their huts 
and form a group of listeners. Often they held back. 
I used my own method of encouraging them to come. 
The vein of mirth and fun in my nature was bound to 
assert itself. I had learned in my work with Americans 
that if I wanted to come in touch with a group of lis- 
teners I must first laugh with them. The Telugus were 
not different in that respect ; only I had to adjust myself 
to their sense of humor. If a man refused to come be- 
cause he had no coat to wear I took mine off and put it 
on him, and thus marched him to the preaching-place. 
Every face by that time was happy with amusement. My 
sense of humor was part of my natural equipment, and I 
did not restrain it when I began my work in India. 

During all my apprenticeship I sat at the feet of Dr. 
Warren. He brought me into contact with the deep 
spiritual meaning of the missionary's work. With a firm 
hand he had upheld the Telugu Mission thus far. He 
had marked me as the man for it. He now watched me 
in my development. It was not long before he saw that 
the independence in method which I had developed in 
my pioneer life on the Western prairies was going to be 
applied to my work in India. He wanted to see this in- 
dependence brought under the guidance of the Holy 
Spirit, and was ready then, in any given situation, to 
believe that I was doing as Jesus wanted me to do. Dr. 
Warren was strong in the idea of democracy in Baptist 



8o SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

churches. His position all through was : when a mis- 
sionary is in the hands of the Holy Spirit we as a de- 
nomination must fall into line and uphgld him, because 
we sent him out there. I sensed this attitude in him from 
the beginning. It affected me in the hidden depths of 
my missionary motive. 

In my letters of those early years Dr. Warren saw that 
I was forming human contacts everywhere. There was 
attraction and there was repulsion. Twice during my 
apprenticeship a mob was ready to fall upon our mission 
house. He wrote me a long letter, in which he taught me 
how to get hold of people in order to bring them to 
Jesus. He did not want me to sit in the mission house 
studying my Bible, keeping up in due form the Sunday 
services, praying and singing and preaching. He wanted 
me to break forth on all sides. "Those people will be- 
lieve in you first as the representative of Christ. Some 
of them will be won by mere human sympathies, at the 
outset, and led step by step into the spiritual house, the 
temple of God. . . . The first disciples learned religion 
from the person of Christ, not from abstract ideas. . . . 
Move among the people; get hold of them; draw them 
to you." This counsel was true to my natural tempera- 
ment, and I willingly followed Dr. Warren in the spir- 
itual application. 

Six months after our arrival I wrote to him, November 
6,1865: 

"Christianity and our mission begin to occupy the place 
and exert the influence which they ought. Yet we want 
more of the influence of the Holy Spirit among us and in 
us. I am no longer able to keep quiet, and daily go out 
with the catechists to the villages near the mission house, 
preaching. Yesterday was a happy day for the Tone Star' 
Mission. It was my privilege to baptize four, upon profes- 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 8 1 

sion of their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Our prayers 
are beginning to be heard. God is sending us his elect, a 
great multitude of whom we expect to see here among the 
Telugus ere many years, who shall come out from heathen- 
ism and join the throng which is passing into the kingdom 
of heaven from all parts of the world. We are earnestly 
asking God to give us at least one hundred, before the 
close of the year 1866, seals of our ministry. 

"The Tone Star' Mission has stood here in the midst 
of darkness deeper than night for about twenty-five years ; 
yet few, very few, have 'believed our report.' We feel 
that this cannot longer be endured — that God has an elect 
people here, and that they must come out from the reckless 
multitude and unite themselves with the children of light." 

Dr. Warren replied to this letter January 27, 1866, as 
follows : 

"I am this hour in receipt of your favor of November 6, 
1865, a very long time on the way for letters from Nellore 
— three months. But the news compensated for the delay. 
It really does me good to follow your pen as it discloses 
your restive desire to be out, with the open mouth and the 
moving tongue, among the people, with the messages of 
salvation. I am glad the word is like fire shut up in your 
bones, for I see in it your calling of God to that very work, 
and a pledge at once of your fitness for it and your success 
in it. . . . And the Lord grant your largest petition, and 
enlarge your heart to ask still greater things. I notice you 
are asking for one hundred converts this year. That is 
well, very well, and if we had so many we might think that 
the Lord has indeed made windows in heaven. But, really, 
why not ask for a thousand, as well as for one hundred f 

"And then, I must say I like your idea of seeking after 
the 'elect' of God in that dark land. That is the true idea. 
It is the only solid ground to stand on in missionary work. 
. . . The very fact that he has sent you there, with such 
a purpose as you cherish, is of itself evidence that he means 



B2 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

you to gather fruits for himself, *Sons unto glory/ Go on 
and prosper then, and may you see scores and thousands 
turning unto God. My heart is with you, and so are the 
hearts of all the brethren here." 



I was full of hope in those days. The prophetic tone 
had been a characteristic of the mission. Mr. Day had 
been upheld by his faith in great things. Dr. Jewett was 
always talking of "much people." Now I took it up. It 
was afterwards said in the mission that "Clough talked 
wild in those days." I had a friend there in Nellore who 
later held a high post in the educational department of 
the government in Madras. He says he was reasoning 
with me one day, asking me what I was going to do with 
that multitude which I expected to see coming over to 
Christianity. He wanted to know where I was going to 
get the money to supply them with Christian teaching. I 
told him that if I tried I could get one hundred thousand 
dollars from America for this purpose. It was a daring 
statement. The whole annual income of our society at 
that time did not rise much higher than that figure. It 
took twenty-five years to bring it to pass. 

According to the actual facts of our every-day life in 
Nellore, our prayer for one hundred converts during 1866 
was not granted. They did not come. We thought the 
failure must be due to the native preachers, who had con- 
tentions among themselves, and were divided. I wrote, 
"I think our faith was too weak to remove so large a 
weight." Dr. Warren, on the other hand, wrote accord- 
ing to the larger vision, "Why not ask for a thousand ?" 
Less than two months after he had penned this question 
a man was baptized who, during the thirty years of his 
ministry, led more than one thousand people to believe 
in Jesus. Less than twelve months after Dr. Warren 
asked that question two lads were baptized, Baddepudy 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 83 

Abraham and Bezwada Paul, who each stood, potentially, 
for thousands of converts. They became evangelists to 
their people. If Dr. Warren had asked, "Why not ask 
for five thousand?" — he would have been right. 

Meanwhile I was having an experience there in Nel- 
lore with the Brahmans. Several Brahman young men 
had been coming to see me. I had fixed upon Sunday 
afternoon for visits of this kind, but they began to come 
at other times also. They could talk English somewhat, 
and in the beginning they were attracted, no doubt, by 
the opportunity to talk with a white man. They also ap- 
preciated my friendliness. I told them about my relig- 
ion. They argued with me. It must be that Jesus met 
them and they felt his power. Two out of that group of 
Brahman young men were, I believe, converted. They 
asked for baptism and set the time for the first Sunday 
in April. Great excitement now spread over Nellore. 
Few understood what the ordinance of Christian baptism 
meant. All looked upon it as hopeless degradation for a 
man of high caste to unite himself religiously with a com- 
pany of people composed of the lower caste. None of 
the Nellore Christians were higher than the Sudra caste. 

The families of the Brahman young men now took 
matters in hand. All were forbidden to see me. One of 
the two who had requested baptism was sent to a distant 
part of the Telugu country. The other was subjected to 
petty persecution by his family. They held him by force. 
He was locked up in his room at night, and guarded by 
two men by day. He had begun to pray to Jesus Christ, 
and had omitted the Brahmanical ceremonies required of 
him every morning. They now dragged him to the river ; 
they ordered him to say his mantras and to draw the 
mark on his forehead, indicating that he had done so. 
He refused. 

There was a large community of Brahmans in Nel- 



84 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

lore, many of them wealthy, learned and influential. They 
felt that something must be done. The tahsildar, the 
highest native official in Nellore, was one of them, and 
they appealed to him. He issued an edict that no Brah- 
man should come to our mission house or receive our 
books. He had no right to do this. It was contrary to 
the proclamation of religious liberty issued by the Eng- 
lish Crown in 1858. But if I had protested against his 
edict he would have claimed that it was intended only for 
the men of his own caste and religious order, and that in 
any case it was preferable to having a mob attack the 
mission house, with possible bloodshed. His order was 
obeyed. All became quiet, as if nothing had happened. 
Only once in a while, though closely watched, one of 
those two converts came to see me. I had had my first 
contact with the Brahmans, and had felt their power. 

Right into the midst of this came a letter from Ongole 
bearing the call — not loud, but distinct — -from Yerra- 
guntla Periah, the forerunner of a mass movement to- 
ward Christianity among the outcaste. He belonged to 
a primitive tribe, the Madigas, leather workers by trade, 
in servitude to all, poor, ignorant, despised. There were 
no Madigas in the Nellore church. Dr. Jewett and I 
were somewhat perplexed ; we feared complications. We 
agreed, however, that it was not open to us to debate 
this. We were bound to receive everyone who believed 
in Jesus Christ. 

Thus was I wheeled around from dealing with the 
Brahmans, who stood at the top of the social ladder in 
India, way over to the other extreme— the outcaste, 
whom no one wanted. I did not know then that after 
opening the door to this one man among the Madigas a 
whole multitude of them would come pressing in. Nor 
did I realize that by opening the door to the Madigas 
we were closing it against all others. When it dawned 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 85 

on me what we had gained by the coming of the Madigas 
and what we had lost — it was too late to change. 

At this time, while I was walking straight into the 
bitterest disappointment of my whole missionary career, 
not knowing what I was doing, since it all came in the 
ordinary events of daily life, I received a letter from Dr. 
Warren. He wrote : 

"I pray your joys may abound. I am not unwilling your 
trials should be many. Baptisms in suffering must be. Do 
not be alarmed if you see them approaching, for they open 
the way to great consolations, Godlike deliverances. With 
unspeakable pleasure I leave you in the hands of God. In 
such keeping how safe you are, and how certain of attain- 
ing to everlasting blessedness." 

I had been in India nearly a year and had not yet seen 
Ongole, we had been so hard at work in Nellore. Dr. 
Jewett and I decided that we should now take that jour- 
ney. It was already March, 1866; the hot season would 
soon be upon us. He had much to show me in Ongole : 
the bungalow and compound, and "Prayer Meeting Hill," 
not far away. But as we went on that journey no one 
said to us that I was now to be taken to the place where 
forty years of hard work were waiting for me. No one 
as yet had said that I was "the man for Ongole.'* I was 
taking root in Nellore ; Dr. Jewett was thinking strongly 
of letting me remain there. He was willing to settle in 
Ongole, with Mrs. Jewett, who was back with him at her 
post, their children left in America. 

We took our way along the seacoast and halted at 
the rich town of AUur. A good deal of preaching had 
been done here. We wanted to make it a mission station. 
We went thirty miles farther and halted at Ramapatnam. 
Dr. Jewett felt strongly that we must begin work here. 



86 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

I agreed with him. A missionary society south of us had 
recently asked us whether we intended to cover the ter- 
ritory between Nellore and Ongole with our operations. 
They were expecting large reen for cement and were map- 
ping out their field. We asked them to leave the stretch 
of eighty miles between Nellore and Ongole to us. The 
distrust, both in America and in India, concerning the 
capacity of our Telugu Mission was something which I 
could not have endured much longer. 

We reached Ongole. It counted at that time about 
6,000 inhabitants; later it rose to 10,000. There was 
no other town of that size within a radius of fifty 
miles. It was therefore important as a center of trade. 
My first impression of Ongole did not make me en- 
thusiastic. I saw that anyone who settled there would 
have plenty of elbow room. I saw, too, that the property 
secured by Dr. Jewett's vigilance gave us a good foot- 
hold for work. It had a forlorn look at that time. The 
compound of eleven acres had been made a grain field 
to help pay the taxes. The bungalow had been rented to 
an English official, who lived in it. There were four 
rooms of about equal size. The roof, covered with tiles, 
was too low for safety during the hot season. The 
verandas were thatch-covered. Was I to bring my fam- 
ily here, and make this our home? 

There was one peculiar fact about Ongole which did 
not come into consideration with me at that time, because 
I did not know what the future had in store for me. I 
was always talking about a "multitude of the elect." If 
it was so ordained that I was to bring in the con- 
verts from the territory of about 7,000 square miles 
which was for years called "the Ongole field," then I had 
to locate at Ongole. Three trunk roads began in Ongole 
and led into the region where the movement spread. 
From no other town could I have reached so easily the 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 87 

districts where afterwards our Christians lived. They 
could come to me in almost a straight line. Those roads 
were military roads. Long ago they had been merely 
country tracks; they were improved when English regi- 
ments began to pass back and forth. The great road 
leading from Madras to Calcutta also went through 
Ongole. 

The government had regarded Ongole as a strategic 
point. After the conquest of that part of India, when 
English magistrates were appointed to important centers, 
one was located at Ongole. This was about the year 
1790. A regiment of English soldiers was stationed 
there for some time. We missionaries fell into line with 
statesmanship. What was strategic to the state was 
strategic to religion also. The roads improved for the 
purpose of military and commercial traffic were the roads 
our people traveled when they wanted salvation for their 
souls. No doubt a firm Hand was guiding us. We 
builded better than we knew. 

The inquirer, Yerraguntla Periah, lived at Tallakonda- 
paud, forty miles southwest of Ongole. We sent for him. 
I went back to Nellore to my work. Dr. Jewett stayed 
and waited. It was right that after all his faith, and his 
holding on, he should have had this disciple all to him- 
self, to leave the imprint of his benediction upon him. 
He came back to Nellore and with joy in his heart told 
me all. He wrote to Dr. Warren : 



"This man, unable to read a word, belonging to a class too 
low to be despised, impressed on my mind the image of 
patriarchal life. The simplicity of his story, the sincerity 
of his faith, and the ardor of his love, shining forth 
through the tears which flowed down his cheeks — all bore 
witness to the saving work of God in his soul. His wife 
in the same spirit of simplicity, faith, and love told the 



88 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

artless story of her conversion. These were some of the 
happiest moments of my life. I was ready in a moment to 
baptize them." 

He had given several days wholly to teaching this man 
and his wife. They were hungry and thirsty for all they 
could learn about the Lord Jesus and this Christian re- 
ligion. When Dr. Jewett was not talking with them they 
asked questions of the preacher who had come with him. 
They eagerly accepted the tracts and books given them, 
ready to carry them back the forty miles. With a few 
copper coins they were going to hire some one to read to 
them. They had left behind in their village a group of 
people who looked anxiously for their return ; they, too, 
wanted to place their feet upon this path. 

We were amazed. Dr. Jewett and I were of one mind : 
the time had come to act. One of us must go. I was on 
fire. With a revival already begun in that distant part 
of the field, I wanted to be in the midst of it. Dr. Jewett 
now treated me as a father treats a son. He had seen 
twenty years of missionary life. I stood on the threshold 
of mine. He gave me the right of way. He let me state 
my case to Dr. Warren and told me to send the letter. 
He did not add a word himself. Dr. Warren understood 
his silence. 

The rough draft of my letter to Dr. Warren, dated 
March 24, 1866, is still among my papers, a long docu- 
ment, written in pencil. Usually I struck out with bold- 
ness and decision when I wanted anything. Not so here ; 
I evidently needed to convince myself, and I gave Dr. 
Warren the benefit of my argument. I told him about 
Allur and Ramapatnam, and added that I was willing to 
go to either place. I argued that our best man should 
stay in Nellore, and that government officials, too, send 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 89 

their juniors to the outstations. I wanted to be treated 
as a junior. I wrote : 

"Lastly, I must confess that I have a little ambition to 
see if the Lord will not bless my labors in India. If I work 
here I may build on other men's foundation. This Paul 
was not anxious to do. If you send me to Ongole, a great 
wilderness will be before me. If I succeed, to God will be 
the glory. If I fail, it will show that I am not in the right 
place." 

It took that letter two months to go to Boston, and 
before another three months had passed I had my an- 
swer. It was dated June 13, 1866 : 

*T have long been looking with a covetous eye upon On- 
gole, and hoping the time would come when we should be 
able to occupy it as a mission station, and locate a mis- 
sionary there. That time, I am happy to believe, draws 
nigh. The Executive Committee are with me fully in that 
opinion, and so placed themselves on record yesterday. It 
only remains that you, in accordance with this vote, go for- 
ward and execute it. 

"You will need something to defray expenses of removal, 
and I shall endeavor to put in an item for that purpose. I 
should really love to go with you, help you on your way, 
and settle down with you in your new home. Those souls 
are worth saving, every one of them. Yes, one of them is 
worth going a long way to save. 'While we look, not at' 
the things which are seen, but at the things which are not 
seen; for the things that are seen are temporal, but the 
things that are not seen are eternal/ If we could so look, 
how would our estimates of all things be changed. How 
should we labor for souls!" 

Thus I received my marching orders. Dr. Warren 
had given me his benediction on the way. I was by this 



90 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

time very eager to go to Ongole. We had sent three 
preachers out in the direction of Tallakondapaud where 
Periah Hved. They found him burning with zeal for the 
souls of his fellow-men and far ahead of themselves in 
his desire to preach. He made them get up long before 
daybreak and go to villages at a distance. It was during 
the hot season and he carried a big pot of buttermilk on 
his head for them to drink when thirsty. When the three 
preachers returned to Nellore they reported that prob- 
ably two hundred people in the region of Tallakondapaud 
were believing in Christ. This report was exaggerated, 
but it stirred us all. 

The question was, who of the staff of six helpers was 
to go with us, and who was to stay behind ? They were 
full of enthusiasm and ready to go. We divided even. 
Dr. Jewett kept three and sent three with us : Tupili Run- 
giah, who had been trained by the Jewetts since boyhood, 
Ezra, who had joined the mission later, and Lutchmiah, 
whom I had dug out of heathenism, and their families. 

It was a great event in the history of our Telugu Mis- 
sion when missionaries and helpers started forth to found 
the Ongole Mission, which had thus far been seen only in 
visions and prayers. Toward evening, September 12, 
1866, when it was time for going, the compound filled 
with people. The native Christians and friends, many 
of whom we had learned to love, were there. Their 
hearts were full ; many wept ; they spoke words of bene- 
diction to us. With feelings too deep for utterance I 
took the parting hand of dear Brother Jewett. It was 
now thirteen years since he came down from that moun- 
taintop, convinced that "the man for Ongole" was com- 
ing. We did not know that in another thirteen years the 
Ongole church would number thirteen thousand members. 
We only knew that we were stirred to the depths. 



MY APPRENTICESHIP AT MISSIONS 9 1 

Monday morning, September 17, 1866, at daybreak, 
we came in sight of "Prayer Meeting Hill." Soon we 
halted in front of the bungalow, Mrs. Clough, with Allen, 
in a palanquin, and I on a pony, glad to be at home in 
Ongole. 



VII 

THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT 

Ours was an energetic group as we now began work 
in Ongole. There was nothing half-hearted about us. 
No doubts assailed us. We felt called to this work and 
to this place. We intended, with the blessing of God, 
to succeed. 

Mrs. Clough brought with her a good equipment as 
teacher. During our stay in Nellore she had obtained a 
knowledge of the Telugu language and had studied the 
situation from her point of view. It was understood 
from the first that the school work at Ongole was to 
be in her charge. The wives of the three preachers who 
came with us were her assistants in beginning the work 
for women. We all fell into line. Tupili Rungiah began 
to second my efforts, so that for years I called him my 
right hand man. 

Then there was Yerraguntla Periah. In several im- 
portant decisions which were now before us, he acted as 
spokesman for his people. He and I were influencing 
each other a good deal in those first months in Ongole. 
He regarded me as his teacher, and I, in turn, always 
wanted to know what he had to say, when I came upon 
questions in connection with the work, which were so 
distinctly Indian that I could not easily find my bear- 
ings. Periah was a personality: a man with a spiritual 
history. He had taken more distinct steps in his religious 

92 




THE FORERUNNER OF A MASS MOVEMENT TOWARD CHRISTIANITY 



"Yerraguntla Periah was a personality; a man with a spiritual history. He 
had taken more distinct steps in his religious experience than falls to the lot of 
most white men to take. . . . His request to me was practically that I 
should let this Christian movement go in the channels formed by Indian move- 
ments of spiritual significance. . . . I loved that man. He never in all the 
years failed me. . . ." 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT 93 

experience than falls to the lot of most white men to 
take. He could not read; there was no one in those 
days who could be induced to teach a poor Madiga. It 
was not a matter of study and thought with him: it 
was a matter of living in one phase of Indian religious 
life after another. Born into any other community, he 
would have risen to the top. As a Madiga among Mad- 
igas he stood in bold outline. 

Periah grew up in the modes of worship which be- 
long to the Madiga hamlet. This worship is of a low 
order ; for it is largely actuated by fear of unseen forces. 
The Madigas bow before images and idols that stand 
mostly for non-Aryan cults : serpent worship, mother 
worship in some form, and especially demon worship, 
all ancient as the race. Even though Periah, early in 
life, came in touch with Aryan forms of worship, he did 
not discard the primitive beliefs of his village. The 
break with these came when he heard of Jesus Christ. 

In the time of his grandfather, a Guru of the Rama- 
nuja sect had been invited by the family to come with 
the idols of Vishnu and perform sacred rites before 
them. This was Aryan worship. It dated back to the 
great teacher Ramanuja who lived in the twelfth century, 
the first of a line of Vaishnavite reformers. There is 
resemblance between his teaching and that of Jesus, the 
Christ. Periah considered his contact with this sect an 
advance, both religiously and socially, upon the cults and 
customs of the ordinary Madiga. 

After he had come to maturity a change came. He had 
heard that through the practice of Yoga the soul could 
unite with God. Eagerly he now entered this path. 
His teacher was an elderly woman, Bandikatla Veerama 
by name, who came to a neighboring village to visit 
her children. She was an initiated disciple of the Yogi 
Pothuluri Veerabrahmham, one of those religious per- 



94 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

sonalities who are deeply revered by the Hindus. He 
lived about a century ago and was known in all that 
region as a Saivite reformer of pure life. A band of 
disciples had gathered around him to whom he gave the 
inner teaching of his order. The common people were 
taught by him that God is Spirit. He filled thousands 
with the expectation of an incarnation of divine life. As 
in all modern Indian reform movements, whether Vaish- 
navite or Saivite, caste was denounced. This explains 
why Periah could be received as a disciple by the woman 
Guru, Veerama. She was a caste woman and people 
of all castes came to her ; nevertheless, she allowed Periah 
and one other Madiga, who afterwards became a Chris- 
tian preacher, to come to her for instruction. The owner 
of the house which she occupied objected. Rather than 
ask her followers of low degree to stay away, she looked 
for another house. Before her death she initiated Periah. 
This became a leading fact in his life, and gave him a 
standing in the Madiga community which nothing else 
could have given him. 

It was known that for years after his initiation he kept 
up the practice of sitting alone, in meditation, an hour 
every day, his eyes closed, his fingers pressed over ears 
and nostrils, so that objects of sense might be completely 
shut out, and the soul might seek union with the all-per- 
vading Divine Being. As time passed, he was asked to 
come here and there to teach. He had a Guru-staff in 
his hand, which he never discarded, not even after he 
became a Christian preacher. Where he stayed in a vil- 
lage and taught the people, they gave him to eat. It 
seems there was little in his teaching which he afterwards 
had to contradict as evil, when he went among the same 
people to tell them about Jesus. 

Others of the men who afterwards became leading 
Ongole preachers were sitting at the feet of Raja Yoga 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT 95 

teachers during those years. None of those Gurus stood 
as high as the woman Guru, Veerama. They had col- 
lected only snatches here and there of Yoga teaching, 
and gave them out to their followers amid extortion of 
gifts. They had fallen from the high moral standard 
required of the true Yogi. Periah knew wherein the dif- 
ference lay. He held aloof from the shiftless Gurus who 
came and went. Of Veerama he never spoke with any- 
thing but deep respect. Even in his old age he said, 
"What the teachers of Yoga told me was good. But 
nothing satisfied my soul till I heard of Jesus Christ." 
The years passed. Periah must have been nearly fifty 
years old when the greatest change in his life came to 
him. It now happened that he found occasion for travel. 
In the Godavari district many cattle were dying, stung 
by a poisonous fly, and hides therefore were cheap. 
Others of the more intelligent and prosperous Madigas 
were going north to buy several cartloads of hides and 
bring them back to sell at large profit. It was an un- 
dertaking; sometimes the traders were gone a year or 
two. As they took their way north, they passed through 
the town of Ellore, about one hundred miles northeast 
of Ongole. A mission station had been located here by 
the Church of England. Rev. F. N. Alexander was the 
missionary at that time and continued in that place for 
many years, a man full of zeal, with methods thoroughly 
evangelistic. 

Some years before, a Madiga trader had heard him 
preach, when out on tour. The message sank into his 
heart; he sought instruction and was received into the 
Ellore church. He had built a hut and settled in the 
north with his family. This man, Vongole Abraham, 
was distantly related to Periah and a number of others 
who afterwards constituted the staff of Ongole preachers. 
Family relationship, however distant, is cherished by the 



g6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Madigas. The traders looked upon Abraham as a friend 
in that northern country. He gave them hints in a busi- 
ness way that helped them in trade. They stayed with 
him sometimes for a day or two. The new religion then 
became a topic of conversation. 

That group of men, after being banded together to 
find out something of truth from the teachers of Yoga, 
now became banded together in learning something of 
the Christian religion. It was not made easy for them. 
They gathered up a little here and there, and as they met 
in trade, they told each other of it. The one on whom 
they chiefly relied was Vongole Abraham. If he had not 
settled in that northern district, and become a man of 
active Christian character, something might have gone 
wrong with the movement toward Christianity. He 
formed an important link in the chain of happenings. 

It is a remarkable fact that the leaders of the move- 
ment were going through this singular course of prep- 
aration during the years while I was forced into giving 
up my own ambitions for a career, and the American 
Baptists found it impossible to abandon their Telugu 
Mission. These separate strands of human experience 
came to a meeting point when Periah's longing for Chris- 
tian fellowship overpowered him, and he called to me 
to come. 

Periah, up there in that northern district, felt that he 
must get some first-hand information about Jesus Christ. 
He went to EUore. The mission bungalow was easily 
found. Mr. Alexander was always accessible. He gave 
Periah abundant time in an interview, and asked him 
to remain to a meal in his compound. It was not neces- 
sary to teach Periah that there is one God and he is 
Spirit. He had learned this and much else when on 
the path of Yoga. He wanted to know about the divine 
incarnation of Jesus Christ. Mr. Alexander told him 



I 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT 97 

the story with all the power of his own personal belief 
in it. Periah said, "This religion is true. My soul is 
satisfied." He wanted to unite with the Christians. 
When Mr. Alexander learned that his home was far 
south, and that he intended soon to return there, he 
advised him to unite with the Christian mission nearest 
to his home. This was wise, far-seeing policy on the 
part of Mr. Alexander. Had his advice to Periah been 
otherwise, something again might have gone wrong with 
that movement. 

Mr. Alexander was a friend of Dr. Jewett and knew 
that I had come with him, and that one of us would 
settle in Ongole. He said to Periah, "You are going 
back to your home. Inquire from time to time, for soon 
a white teacher is coming to Ongole. Go to him; he 
will tell you more about this religion." 

Periah was a changed man when he returned to his 
village. He knelt and prayed to a God of whom no one 
had ever heard; he refused to bow to the old village 
gods. It was not easy to persecute and abuse him. His 
relatives and neighbors withdrew from him, hoping thus 
to bring him to his senses. This had no effect on him. 
He told them, "I shall go to the people of the Christian 
sect, and I shall eat with them." As time passed, his 
wife Nagama became of one mind with him. Then 
others began to ask him what he knew of Jesus Christ. 
He was preaching, and giving out to others what he 
had learned in a fragmentary way. People believed his 
message. 

But it was a weary time for him. Often he inquired 
of those who came that way: "Has no white teacher 
come to Ongole?" He could bear the waiting no longer; 
he walked the forty miles to Ongole, and was shown the 
compound that belonged to the Nellore missionary. In 
one corner of it was a hut, which Obulu, the first of the 



98 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Ongole converts, had built for himself. About eight 
years previously, Dr. Jewett was preaching in the Ongole 
bazaar, when this man came and listened a while, and 
said, "I am sunk in a sea of sin. These are just the 
words I want." 

The coming of the Ongole missionary was the burden 
on Obulu's soul. When the Jewetts embarked for Amer- 
ica, he walked all the way to Madras and begged them 
to bring back with them the man for Ongole. Obulu 
was there, in that hut, in the corner of that compound, 
when Periah came and asked, "Where is the white 
teacher who was coming to Ongole?" Had Obulu not 
been there, it is possible that the movement might have 
miscarried even then. Periah might have failed to make 
connection with us: I might have become permanently 
settled in Nellore, and his call, had it come later, might 
have fallen on deaf ears. 

But Obulu was there. He gave Periah an abounding 
sympathy. He directed him to the house of an over- 
seer of public works, where Dr. Jewett sometimes held 
meetings. Periah went there and made a deep salaam, 
and said, "Where is the white teacher? I believe in 
Jesus Christ. I want Christian fellowship." Then the 
letter was written that reached us in Nellore at a de- 
cisive hour. It was the last link in a long chain of hap- 
penings. Afterwards, in his old age, Periah sometimes 
said to the younger men, "I called our Clough Dhora, and 
he came." It is true that he called me. Soon after his 
baptism he came to Nellore to see me. His joy was 
great: I was the man for whom he had long waited. 
With all the devotion of his nature he henceforth held to 
me. He gave me a spiritual allegiance of a high order. 
Afterwards, when my staff of preachers counted fifty 
men, strong men among them, on whom I leaned, Periah 
never lost his place close to me, though often I saw him 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT 99 

only once in three months. Everybody knew that Periah 
had a distinctive position with me, which no one need 
covet, or desire for himself; for it would remain vacant 
when Periah died. 

With the deepest interest Periah looked on, as we 
settled down at Ongole and made the place habitable. 
The bungalow had to be repaired, and houses erected 
on the compound for the preachers who came with us. 
On one of those early visits to Ongole, he brought with 
him his young kinsman, Bezwada Paul. I saw that 
he was a lad of some promise, and asked Periah to leave 
him with us. I found work for him to do in connection 
with our household, so that he could become one of us. 
Mrs. Clough took him into the little school on our 
veranda. My main object was to let him stay as an 
anchorage to the Madiga community. The movement 
among the Madigas was already on us. 

Periah told me that there were believers out in his 
village, Tallakondapaud, perhaps twenty or thirty in 
number. He urged me to come and baptize them. I 
now talked this over with him. In those early days of 
the mission we observed the Lord's Supper on every 
first Sunday of the month. Periah always came walk- 
ing the forty miles each way ; often Nagama came with 
him. I asked him to bring those believers to Ongole in 
groups, that we might receive them into the Ongole 
church. This was not according to his mind. He had 
a definite plan. He wanted me to come out there, to 
stay several days, giving spiritual instruction, and then to 
baptize those who gave evidence that they were sincere 
believers in Jesus. It was to be done in such a way 
that the tidings would be carried over all that region. 
Everyone would know that there had been a definite 
act of forming a religious center, from which spiritual 
influences could now be expected to radiate. It was 



lOO SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

an oriental way of urging the planting of a Christian 
church. 

With his capacity for organizing people into groups, 
Periah may have gathered points here and there about 
the Christian church, and applied them to his own case 
with a kind of unerring religious instinct. He had asked 
searching questions from Mr. Alexander and his cate- 
chists; he had sat for days at Dr. Jewett's feet, and 
had talked for hours with our Nellore preachers. Pos- 
sibly some one had read the Acts of the Apostles to 
him. These sources of knowledge of our Western way 
of organizing may have, been tapped by him. But it 
is far more likely that he worked this out on the pat- 
tern of the Indian Guru. He had ceased to be a Raja 
Yoga Guru and had become a Christian preacher by a 
simple sequence of events. These believers who were 
waiting out there were his disciples. He wanted me now 
to come as one of long experience in the Christian life 
and give sanction to all that had been done. Among 
the Gurus there is a hierarchy. He of deeper experience 
and higher initiation leads those of less. These oriental 
conceptions were all a part of Periah' s mental equipment. 
His request now to me was practically that I should let 
this Christian movement go in the channels formed by 
Indian movements of spiritual significance. 

It must be that the Lord Jesus gave to Periah a clear 
conception of the design which we were to work out, 
and that he gave to me sufficient spiritual vision to grasp 
its bearings. The plan, as I thought it over, seemed right 
to me and in accordance with New Testament methods. 
In the days of the apostles the church at Jerusalem re- 
ceived tidings of a Christian movement in the city of 
Antioch. They sent out Barnabas, a man in whom they 
had full confidence, as one who would deal wisely with 
the situation. Though all were Gentiles, he remained 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT lOI 

with the believers at Antioch until they were established 
as a group related to the church at Jerusalem. With 
Antioch as the beginning, the apostles formed Christian 
centers among the Gentiles. In like manner with us, at 
Ongole, the beginning which we made at Tallakondapaud 
formed the pattern. Before ten years had passed we 
had thirty such centers scattered over seven thousand 
square miles, all affiliated to the church at Ongole. We 
could not have held ourselves more closely to the way 
indicated in apostolic times. 

My decision to go out to Tallakondapaud was an act 
of faith on my part. I knew nothing of the background 
of religious experience which filled this group of con- 
verts with so much zeal. Books on the Indian religions 
were few in those days. I was new in the country. 
Moreover, to me the Hindus were all heathen. If any- 
one had tried to explain to me that I was now to draw 
into a Christian movement the fervor which had been 
generated in an Indian movement, I would probably 
have refused to believe him. I felt the risk keenly. I 
would willingly have baptized those people, a few at a 
time, as they came to Ongole, for it would not have 
caused much comment, even if nothing more was heard 
from them. But to go out there, and in that dramatic 
form baptize a group of people, establish a Christian 
center, and recognize its leader as the pastor was a dif- 
ferent matter. Those people were all outcastes, only 
one could read a little. Suppose the whole thing died 
down after a time! Then it could justly be said that 
a new recruit in the service, as I then was, had no 
right to assume so much responsibility. However, I felt 
that I must take the risk and go ahead. 

First, we had to organize a Baptist church at Ongole, 
so that these converts could be baptized into its fel- 
lowship. We had eight members who had letters of dis- 



102 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

missal from the Nellore church. Our church at Ongole 
was organized January i, 1867, We observed the week 
of prayer. Then, full of strength, ready for anything that 
might come, I undertook the first of my many long mis- 
sion tours. Mrs. Clough remained behind, in charge of 
the compound. I borrowed a tent from an English of- 
ficer. As I had no pony, I went in an ordinary bullock- 
cart. I halted at villages on the way and preached. 
Finally I reached Tallakondapaud, and was gladly wel- 
comed by Periah and his wife. My tent was pitched 
in a fine tamarind grove near by, and here now I 
took my first lesson in the simple village life that was 
so new to me. Word was passed from village to vil- 
lage that I had come. The next day thirty or forty 
men and women appeared before the tent, each with 
provisions for several days, tied up in a cloth. They 
said they had come to learn more about Jesus, but that 
they already believed and wanted to be baptized. 

"Then commenced a series of meetings in that tamarind 
grove that continued for five days, which I can never forget. 
There were thirty-five in constant attendance, and many 
others at times. The meetings were for preaching, prayer, 
and reading the Scriptures and inquiry. At the end of the 
fifth day, Sunday, January 20th, twenty-eight were baptized 
in the river, a quarter-mile distant, upon profession of their 
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. These meetings and these 
baptisms almost made me think that another day of Pente- 
cost was being given to us. I have seen many revivals at 
home, and witnessed many precious outpourings of the Holy 
Spirit, but I never saw such a blessed time as this was — 
never saw such faith and such love for Jesus the Saviour. 

"The simple reading of the last two chapters of Mat- 
thew, or the corresponding chapters in the other gospels, 
or the remark that Christ died upon the cross for us and 
for the sins of the whole world, would affect them all to 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT IO3 

tears, and many of them would sob aloud, as though they 
had just lost their dearest friend. Their faith is simple, 
but, oh, how strong. Such faith as these little ones possess 
would be a treasure to anyone, even to the best Christian, 
and must result in the conversion of a great multitude. 
Those baptized live in six villages, and are of all ages, 
from fifteen to seventy years ; but the majority are young 
men and women between twenty and thirty years of age." 

The long letter to Dr. Warren, of which the above 
was a part, had far-reaching results. A man came to 
Boston from Canada, as a candidate for foreign service 
under our Board. He wanted to go to the Karen Mis- 
sion. Dr. Warren put this letter from me into his hands 
and said, "Read and pray and tell me what you think 
of it." It took him one night. The next day it was 
settled. He was to come to the Telugus. This man was 
Rev. A. V. Timpany. He joined us in 1868, three years 
after our arrival. Timpany's coming to us influenced 
McLaurin to follow two years later. Together they be- 
came founders later on of the Canadian Baptist Mission 
in the Telugu country north of our mission. That Tal- 
lakondapaud baptism was a great occasion. 

I gave myself wholly to the people during those days. 
They were hungry and thirsty for every word of divine 
truth I could tell them. They sat for hours and could 
not get enough. I, in turn, felt my faith refreshed be- 
yond measure. I wrote to Dr. Warren: "The ex- 
periences of those days were worth more to me than 
I can tell. I can toil on now patiently. ... I look for 
great things from the Lord." Perhaps it was neces- 
sary that I should receive this spiritual uplift; for a 
heavy load was slowly adjusting itself to my shoulders. 
These people were Madigas. Perhaps men of all other 
castes would therefore refuse my message. I had need 
of strength. 



I04 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

It was a remarkable group of people. Afterwards it 
came to be regarded as a distinction to have been one 
of those twenty-eight. There was Bezwada Paul, whom 
I brought from Ongole with me to receive baptism 
among his people. He was a born evangelist. There 
was another like him in that group, a lad whom I saw 
standing with the rest after the baptism. Something 
in him appealed to me. I wanted him. I took him by 
the hand and said, *'You must come with me, my boy, 
I will take you into school and teach you." He replied 
with joy, "I will come." I said, "But your parents will 
say No." He shook his head. He was ready to forsake 
all and follow: "Nevertheless, I will come." It was 
hard for his parents to let him go. I had to help them 
sometimes to make up to them for the loss of their son. 
This was Baddepudy Abraham, one of the most active 
evangelists of the movement. Often in later years he 
told of those days with tears in his eyes. He said : "We 
could sit together for hours and talk of Jesus. If one 
of us spoke of the nails driven into his hands, or the 
thorns on his brow, we could hardly bear to hear it. 
We sobbed like children. We said to each other: *He 
endured this for us.' Never again was our bhakti— our 
devotion — as it was in those days." 

The report of this baptism spread over the country. 
Periah had calculated the effects rightly. First it was 
in the form of a rumor, then the Madigas took hold of 
definite facts — there was something in it that stirred 
them. Up in the northern districts there were two men, 
bent on trade, who were soon to become Christian 
preachers. One of them, Pidatala Periah, had spent years 
in trying to find salvation through Raja Yoga Gurus. 
To six of them, one after another, he had given money, 
in the hope that they would tell him something to save 
his soul. The worthless character of these men had 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT IO5 

obliterated anything of truth which might have lain 
hidden in their teaching. Weary at heart, heavily in 
debt through these Gurus, he now heard the rumors of 
a new religion. One day a neighbor from the old home 
passed that way on business. He told these two men 
what had happened, and went his way. Each had a son, 
as well as friends, among the twenty-eight. They sat 
down together very sad; they could hardly keep back 
the tears. Pidatala Periah said: "The brothers born 
after me and my own son are on the way to heaven 
before me. I cannot stay here longer." The next day 
they procured carts, to load one hundred hides on each, 
and to start for home. They came to me, full of glad- 
ness. I was amazed at it all and could not understand 
it. Had they tried to explain it to me, I could not have 
understood their search for truth ; it was all too com- 
plicated. 

Before I left Tallakondapaud I talked at length with 
Periah. Out there, in the setting of his own village, the 
man's patriarchal bearing appeared in noble outline. 
A born leader, he was now a Christian preacher by the 
grace of God. I told him that I wanted him to give up 
all leather work and devote his time wholly to preaching. 
He was willing to do this : he was going to preach in 
any case. My request, however, called for a readjust- 
ment of his personal affairs, li he was to stop all leather 
work, then how could he provide for his family ? Where 
he was known as Guru, he was given to eat, and some- 
thing besides. But I wanted him to go where he was 
not known, where no one would trust him as a spiritual 
teacher until he had come again and again. In such 
places who would give him to eat? How would those 
depending on him at home fare meanwhile? It came 
to this : In so far as Periah could stay in the groove of 
the Hindu Guru, he wanted no support. But where I 



I06 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

wanted him to go into Christian evangelistic work out- 
side that groove, there I must give him support. I 
grasped the situation. 

Had Periah asked for a monthly salary, it is probable 
that I would have given him all he asked; for I felt 
the services of the man were beyond valuation by money. 
This would have changed the whole policy of the Ongole 
Mission, as it lay in the future. The fact is, that Periah 
and I at that time worked out and established a system 
of self-support which has endured to the present day. 
Periah knew that if he were to receive monthly salary 
from me, it would upset the relations, deeply cherished 
by him, with those to whom he was a spiritual teacher. 
The staff of Ongole preachers, as it increased rapidly 
in number, counted in those early days several men with 
an experience back of them similar to that of Periah. 
It was congenial to their minds to be given to eat, in a 
humble way, by those whom they had just taught. If 
that increasing staff of men had all asked monthly sal- 
aries, I would soon have been bankrupt. 

There was another important direction in which 
Periah and I settled, then and there, the policy of the 
Ongole Mission. As he talked with me, he thought it 
all over, that he was to go from village to village, fifty, 
even eighty, miles from home, to be gone from home 
for weeks, even months at a time. He said, *'How can 
I go about alone all the time?" I replied, "Take Na- 
gama, your wife, with you, and you will be two.** He 
assented gladly. An unusual relation existed between 
Periah and his wife. The native people often spoke 
of it with deep respect ; they knew of none other like it. 
Among those who practice Yoga there is a teaching that 
sometimes there are two who may marry, whose souls 
are as one soul. It was said that Periah and his wife 
were thus. They had no children. As they now began 



THE DESTINED LEADERS OF A MOVEMENT ID/ 

to make long tours together, they went in perfect union. 
Periah said in his old age: *'What I preached, she 
preached; what I ate, she ate. Nagama was always 
with me." The women loved Nagama, and gathered 
round her when they came to a village. The men looked 
up to Periah, as one who knew more than they. 

The other preachers did likewise. When the wife 
had little children, she stayed and taught the school. All 
saw how Mrs. Clough stood by my side, trusted with 
responsibility. The women of the mission took their 
place from the first in the movement. I subsidized them 
as I did the men. They became a powerful factor in 
Christianizing the Madigas. 

I left Tallakondapaud the night after the baptism. 
They were all there: those who had been baptized and 
about forty others, from surrounding villages. They 
wanted to return home that night and be ready for work 
early the next morning. My cart stood ready for me. 
Still they held me: still I could not bear to part from 
them. It was midnight. We prayed together, and felt 
that many would come and unite with us. It must be 
that Jesus was in our midst. He was touching our 
hearts ; that Indian village became holy ground. In the 
events of those few days lay the germs of the great 
harvest that followed in the name of Jesus. 

Two weeks later Periah and Nagama came to Ongole 
for the Lord's Supper. Their hearts were heavy. Per- 
secution had broken out. The caste people, who expect 
the Madigas to worship and appease the demons who 
afflict men and cattle, had taken note of all that had 
happened. They feared the consequences, and took 
measures of restriction which they thought might satisfy 
those invisible fiends which they dreaded. The Chris- 
tians were ostracized. They were forbidden to come 
to the bazaar to buy, to draw water from the public wells, 



I08 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

to walk on the streets of the villages where they lived. 
All were in trouble. Two families had not so much as 
one meal a day. I felt this condition of affairs keenly. 
If anyone had told me that I was now to enter upon a 
course of steady repetition of such persecutions year 
after year during all the period of my missionary life, 
I would have staggered under the load. I put money 
into Periah's hands for those starving families and sent 
him back to tell them all to stand firm in the faith for 
Jesus' sake. I wrote to the submagistrate out there and 
called upon him to put an end to those persecutions. It 
was well that I did this. Soon disease appeared among 
the cattle. There were deaths. The Christians were 
taken before that magistrate and accused of having 
caused these deaths. He dismissed the prisoners, for he 
could find no fault in them, and strictly charged the 
accusers to cease from troubling them. There was peace 
then for a time. 

Thus it had come to pass that in one short month 
we had organized the Ongole church ; we had begun the 
Ongole method of village evangelization ; we had settled 
on the Ongole policy of self-support; we had given the 
women a status side by side with the men; we had en- 
tered upon suffering for Jesus' sake. The movement 
had begun. 



i 



VIII 

EDUCATION FOR AN ILLITERATE PEOPLE 

There was much coming and going at the mission 
house. The rumor was going over the country that 
there was a white man in Ongole who was preaching 
a new religion, and that it was a good religion. Many- 
came, prompted by curiosity. Some were truly anxious 
to know whether there was something in this religion 
that was meant for them. 

Those who came were of various castes. The fact 
that we were baptizing groups of Madigas frequently, 
and none others, had not become accentuated in the 
minds of people. The crisis had not yet come ; and ours 
was not yet called a Madiga mission. I was happy in 
working with the people, as they came, one or two at 
a time, and I gave much attention to everyone. I could 
say at that time, "Our hearts are filled with gratitude to 
God. He is doing good to us. To him be all the glory. 
Our work and prospects as a mission never looked so 
promising as now." 

Every afternoon, with umbrella in hand, I went out 
to preach. Sometimes I went to a Pariah hamlet of 
four hundred inhabitants, close to our compound. It 
had a bad name. Formerly it had known few quiet 
nights. The police constables were powerless to control 
these Malas. Now an increasing number were coming 
to our Sunday services. The character of the hamlet 

109 



no SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

was changing rapidly. In those days I did much house- 
to-house visiting. I respected prejudices, especially those 
of the caste people, and did not approach their homes 
until they invited me. Often I said to them, *'Do not be 
afraid of me, for I am like your brother, and want to 
talk to you about the true God." This was the way to 
win their confidence. 

I preached in the Ongole bazaar too. Here I met with 
active hostility. Ongole was a very conservative place. 
The caste people were determined to make it impossible 
for me to preach my religion in their hearing. I always 
took one or two of our preachers with me. They stoned 
us. Even though only pebbles were used, they hurt and 
left a mark. I did not take this quietly. I turned around 
and asked who threw that stone. Once they made a 
definite attack with these pebbles; throwing them thick 
and fast, with so much dexterity that no one could be 
detected in the act. The police inspector who watched 
over my safety while I was in Nellore had been trans- 
ferred to Ongole. He knew the temper of the people, and 
insisted that I must let him know when I was going to 
the Ongole bazaar to preach. He wanted a few of his 
constables to be on the border of the crowd that gathered 
around me. The tahsildar of Ongole also feared some 
kind of an outbreak. He could not make me give up 
my preaching, and therefore addressed himself to the 
people. He told them if they did not want to hear me, 
to pass by quietly, but not to throw stones at me, for 
I was only talking about my God and had come to On- 
gole to do them good. No harm came to me in the 
Ongole bazaar, but probably I was in danger more often 
than I realized. 

I was still new in the country and had much to learn. 
I used every means available to inform myself. Scarcely 
a day passed but I came upon something that was new 



EDUCATION FOR AN ILLITERATE PEOPLE III 

to me, which I could not pass by, because it threw light 
on the attitude of the people toward the new religion. 
I asked questions. Often the people from the villages 
wondered that a white man should be so ignorant of all 
that constituted their real world. I tried to be patient 
and sympathetic. I learned from them all, whether out- 
caste or the highest caste. Neither schools nor books had 
anything to do with the teaching I received. It came 
by the human contact of daily life. I began to think 
with the people and to live with the people their lives. 

I had to give up the practice of looking at every- 
thing with my American eyes. Even my American love 
for freedom had to be suppressed, lest I lose ground by 
my indignation over the fetters with which I here saw 
everybody bound. Our American rule of equal rights, 
and of freedom to act according to our own conscience, 
was so self-evident to me, that the system of caste at 
first seemed an absurdity. I thought it must vanish as 
a matter of course, before the first ray of enlightenment. 
That is where I was mistaken. We pioneer missionaries 
would not have believed it possible, in those days, that 
Hinduism would hold out against Christianity as it has 
done. The increase in the Christian population of India 
has come largely through several mass movements from 
the outcaste population. * 

As the months passed, I grasped more and more the 
importance of the social institutions of the people. They 

*The statistics of 191 1 for Protestant missions in India are as 
follows : 

Missionary societies , 117 

Missionaries, men and women S,200 

Indian workers, men and women 38,458 

Organized churches 6,308 

Communicants in these churches 568,080 

Members of the Protestant community 1,636,731 

Members of the Roman Catholic community 1,904,006 

The total population of India 315,132,537 



112 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

had grouped themselves according to race distinctions. 
Their communal life had endured unchanged for many 
centuries. British influence was then beginning to work 
a change. Even at that time social groups, held to- 
gether thus far with tenacity, were breaking up into 
units. But I wondered more and more how the rigor of 
this social system would affect my purpose of preaching 
Jesus Christ to the Hindus. Where was the road lead- 
ing me ? 

The movement among the young Brahmans in Nellore 
had come to an abrupt close. I expected a repetition of 
this, perhaps, among some of the other castes. None 
came. The leading Mohammedan priest of Ongole, a 
wealthy old man, came to see me a number of times. 
He said he believed in Jesus, and wanted to unite with 
us. For a time it seemed that through him we might 
find entrance in the Mohammedan community of that 
region. He ceased to come. I began to have a feeling 
that everyone was drawing back, holding aloof. There 
was a wall of silence, as if I had already hopelessly iden- 
tified myself with the outcaste. I was bound to find 
out what it all meant. 

Often I noticed how the Pariahs kept a distance of 
at least ten feet between themselves and the Brahmans. 
On the public road they walked far over on one side. 
They were evidently in constant fear. When out on tour, 
I sent one of my men to buy food from a caste man. 
I saw how he laid the money on the ground and walked 
away, and the caste man came and picked it up. In 
some of the villages men were afraid of me and ran 
away. I thought, perhaps, they had never before seen a 
white man, and called to them to come. They began 
to cough and to act as if in much pain. When they saw 
that I only intended to talk kindly with them, they 
straightened out; the cough and pain were gone. They 



j 



EDUCATION FOR AN ILLITERATE PEOPLE II3 

evidently had been afraid I was going to coerce them 
into some unpaid service. I saw the outcaste people were 
hunted down by oppression. 

While I was in this condition of wondering why the 
caste people were staying away, wishing always that 
there might be some break in their aloofness, the com- 
mon people came with ever-increasing gladness. It was 
New Testament times over again. I knew all the time 
that I was walking in this respect in the footsteps of 
my Master, Jesus, but I cannot say that I was then 
doing it willingly. Many years later it was said, 
"Clough has converted all the cattle-thieves of this re- 
gion." The Brahmans meant this as a reproach. To 
a servant of the Lord Jesus it was bound to be a com- 
mendation. 

Soon after the baptism of the twenty-eight at Tal- 
lakondapaud, I sent out Preacher Tupili Rungiah to 
strengthen the brethren in their faith, and give them 
Christian teaching. Six weeks later he came back to 
Ongole with a group of twenty-four people, each one 
carrying provisions for several days. Seven requested 
baptism, two were already waiting in Ongole for the 
ordinance. We baptized these nine. The rest had 
walked all the forty miles, impelled by the desire for 
Christian fellowship. "That Sunday evening thirty-one 
native brethren were at the Communion table to com- 
memorate the dying love of Jesus." 

I had given instructions to Rungiah to take counsel 
with Periah, and then jointly to lay it upon this grow- 
ing Christian community as a duty that they must set 
apart some among their number to become teachers and 
preachers. There were Christians now in several vil- 
lages. It was to become a rule that every village furnish 
its man. The people counted this a rare privilege, but it 
meant hardship. I did not ask for the medium ones; 



114 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

I asked for the best. I wanted the men on whom their 
families had learned to lean, because they were resource- 
ful and capable. The mothers of some of the later On- 
gole preachers cried when their sons came to our school ; 
not as my mother cried, because she had to let me go 
to the ends of the earth, but because it meant less to 
eat, less clothing, less of the humble comforts of a Mad- 
iga*s life. In some cases, where I took from aged par- 
ents the son on whom they relied most for support, I 
could not allow such privation; I helped them. How 
the poverty of those Madigas descended upon me at 
that time, as a weight which I never ceased to feel! 

There was no other way open to me but to offer to 
furnish the food for those who came to school. Other- 
wise there would not have been a single man who could 
have stayed longer than a month. In the communal life 
of the Indian village it was not intended that the Madiga 
should lead anything but a hand-to-mouth existence. 
Another consideration was that the kind of men whom 
I wanted were sure to be already married. I let their 
wives come with them to school. They furnished us 
an opportunity to obtain women workers. Some were 
dull, but even these, after a year's training, were so far 
above the women of the villages that they were looked 
upon as teachers. Others were as capable in learning 
to read as their husbands. They afterwards taught 
school in those Christian centers which were springing 
into life. It cost at that time less than two dollars a 
month to keep a man and his wife in our school. I felt 
that this was a small outlay, in view of the great need 
for workers. 

Seven men, in the group which came with Rungiah, 
were ready to enter our school. They formed the nucleus 
in my effort to raise up native agency. I added to them 
constantly, and made it a phase of our work to which 



EDUCATION FOR AN ILLITERATE PEOPLE II5 

I gave much thought. I did not dare continue baptizing 
groups of Madigas, unless I had teachers and preachers 
for them in sight, in our school. The staff of men who 
later worked with me as one man through the events 
which followed, gathered around me during those first 
years at Ongole. One after another they came to our 
school, as if attracted by some spiritual law of gravita- 
tion. I was in the hands of God in those days: my 
methods were made for me, my future co-workers were 
sent to me, and meanwhile I was passing through one 
critical juncture after another. 

Into the midst of these increasing activities came a 
letter from Dr. Warren with the usual notification con- 
cerning the funds which would be at my disposal during 
the coming year, 1867-68. I was dismayed when I saw 
it. There was nothing for schools, and little for any- 
thing else. A year before I had received a similar notifi- 
cation. I then begged for more money, and it was sent. 
I now realized that this had ceased to be a question of 
a mere passing emergency. It had become a case of life 
and death. How was I to preach Jesus and Christianize 
the people without money for native agency and for a 
school in which to prepare this agency? 

I had heard Dr. Jewett tell of Mr. Day's disappoint- 
ment, when an order went forth from our society in 
1850 that all schools in all the missions be closed. He 
had somehow, by soliciting private subscriptions, man- 
aged to continue a small school. Mrs. Jewett had labored 
in the same way. It was hard work for them. Now 
I was to face the same difficulty, accentuated by the fact 
that I already had a movement to deal with. I was not 
willing to submit. I wrote a letter and protested. This 
was my first encounter with the Executive Committee 
and I must say I enjoyed telling about it afterwards. 
For a young recruit like myself to be attacking what 



Il6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

had been their policy for many years was little less than 
impudence. Yet that is what I did. 

Dr. Warren replied without delay. He told me that 
my letter had occasioned some discussion when the treas- 
urer laid it before the Executive Committee. They 
agreed with me that "It is not good economy to place 
a man on missionary ground and withhold suitable means 
and agencies for prosecuting his work. It is not only 
impolitic, it is unmerciful and unjust.'' In principle they 
granted this. When it came to practice — the calls were 
many and the resources limited. Dr. Warren gave me 
a gentle reproof for the forceful tone of my letter. Sev- 
eral of my expressions had "grated on the ears of some 
of our best brethren." He had made it right with the 
brethren, and had told them that I no doubt meant well. 
Perhaps if I had been less emphatic they would have taken 
little notice of my protest. The tide turned in my direc- 
tion. I never afterward lacked money for schools. 

I had come upon fortunate times in this respect. Dur- 
ing the preceding decade there had been a general ten- 
dency in the missionary enterprise to oppose the policy 
of educating orientals into the Christian faith. Our own 
society had shared in this trend of opinion. The cry was 
for evangelization. Then a reversal began to make 
itself felt. An impression gained ground everywhere 
that education must be employed as a legitimate aid to 
evangelization. Liberal views were expressed here and 
there. Cases like mine were viewed with open minds, and 
requests like mine were granted where possible. I thus 
had the current of opinion in the home constituency on 
my side. What I could have done without this I do 
not know. 

While waiting six months for my reply from Boston, 
I had time to think over what to do in case my request 
was not granted. I would certainly have done some- 



EDUCATION FOR AN ILLITERATE PEOPLE II7 

thing about it. The churches in Iowa and IlHnois, where 
I was known, were sending money for me into the treas- 
ury, enough and more than enough to support me. I 
knew that there was more money available, only it would 
be a task to get it. I began even while in Nellore to in- 
terest friends at home in our preachers and pupils. 
Specific gifts were coming in. If now I was to increase 
correspondence of this kind, doing the work of collecting 
funds at home, as well as the work on the foreign field, 
it would result in unequal distribution of labor. I felt 
then as I have always felt, that the lack of supply from 
the home base was the breaking of an unwritten pledge. 
There was money enough in America to pay for the 
Christianizing of an Asiatic people. I felt it a wrong to 
withhold it. This critical juncture pertained to my rela- 
tion to my constituency. 

I was under great pressure otherwise also at that 
time. If the Madigas had delayed for a few years, while 
I was getting a nucleus of converts from the caste people, 
it would not have become an understood fact that ours 
was to be a **Madiga mission." It would have given us 
a chance. But they were coming. The only way open 
to me was to find a bridge between them and the caste 
people; for I had not yet given up the hope that they 
also would receive our message. Education would have 
to form this bridge between our little Christian com- 
munity and the rest. The social status of our converts 
must be raised. Their faith in Jesus Christ was chang- 
ing them fast ; it was making their lives clean. The fact 
that they desired an education was in itself making a 
new people of them. At that time not one Pariah in ten 
thousand knew his alphabet. If now I could demonstrate 
to the caste people that the Madigas would cease to be a 
wholly illiterate community, it surely was bound to affect 



Il8 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

public Opinion. I was ready to stake a good deal on the 
attempt. 

There were three bright boys in our school, sons of 
our preachers, who were ready for advanced classes. 
More boys would soon follow. We saw that we must 
have a school of higher grade, but had not the money 
to engage teachers. All the money we had or could 
obtain would have to be applied to the training of the 
men and women needed for the immediate future. The 
government had a school in Ongole which prepared boys 
for high school, including English. If I could get ad- 
mission into it for those three boys the problem would 
be solved. A growing number of Christian boys and 
lads would be given an education in line with the ex- 
aminations conducted by the educational department of 
the government at Madras. Success in this direction was 
bound to affect the social status of the Christian com- 
munity, and tend to obliterate the fact that its members 
were drawn from the lowest classes. I pondered this 
question a good deal. I talked with the English mag- 
istrate, Judge F. H. Sharp, about it. We decided to 
make a move in that direction. There was much risk in 
it, but as there seemed to be a bare chance of winning, 
I thought I ought to go ahead, feeling my way carefully. 

Like a typical American I had democratic ideas of 
education. An aristocracy of learning, as represented by 
the Brahmans, was foreign to my way of thinking. I 
had the British Government on my side. These three 
boys were British subjects and as Christians were of the 
religion of the ruling race. My first step was to lay 
the matter before the native officials of Ongole, in order 
to influence public opinion of the town through them. 
I told them that we, in America, would not think of ex- 
cluding anyone from our free schools. I urged upon 
them that I was not asking admission for these Chris- 



EDUCATION FOR AN ILLITERATE PEOPLE II9 

tian boys to any school that belonged distinctly to the 
Hindu community. I wanted the right of entrance for 
them to a school located there by the enlightened Chris- 
tian rulers of the land. They listened respectfully, and 
told me they would place nothing in my way. They 
gave me the right to try my scheme. 

The headmaster of the school, a Brahman, invited 
me to visit the school. I went at a time specified, 
and found the tahsildar and munsiff of Ongole had also 
come. The police inspector who had the task of protect- 
ing me was there too. While I was talking in a friendly 
way with headmaster and pupils, I saw those officials 
in consultation. I joined their group. They told me 
as their decided opinion that if I brought the Christian 
boys into the school, all the present pupils would leave. 
Probably their own sons and nephews were among these 
pupils. I gathered from what they said that the sub- 
ject had become the talk of the town. Definite opposi- 
tion was the result. The parents and relatives of the 
boys had threatened to make my attempt impossible. I 
was not prepared to give up. I told them we would 
await the return of Judge Sharp to Ongole, and went 
home with a heavy heart. My diary says: "What the 
result may be I do not know, but I believe that God, 
who does all things well, will bring good out of this, 
and that in the end his name will be glorified the more. 
I do not know how, neither is it any of my business." 

In relying upon the advice and cooperation of Judge 
Sharp, I gave this important matter into the hands of a 
man of extreme measures. Some years later he was 
extreme in his own case and clashed with the policy of 
the government which allowed no interference on the 
part of its officials with the religion of the Hindus. He 
took steps in being instrumental in the conversion of a 
Hindu convict, sentenced by him to death for murder, 



I20 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

which brought censure upon him. The result was a sub- 
ordinate position and the loss of half his pay. He 
had to go to England and appeal to the secretary of 
state in person before he could be reinstated. But I, at 
this juncture in our history, trusted his judgment. 

Some days after my visit to the school Judge Sharp 
returned to Ongole. He took dinner with us one eve- 
ning, and we talked over the situation. He was pre- 
pared to use his power as the highest English official 
at Ongole to the full extent. If it were possible to 
override the prejudices of the Brahmans by the fact 
that this school was for all, he was going to see it 
done. He told me to send the three boys to school the 
next morning. I did so. He sent one of his attendants 
to see what had been done. The man came back and 
reported the boys were not there, thinking he had thereby 
postponed, and perhaps averted, a serious affair. Judge 
Sharp sent me a note and asked me why I had not sent 
the boys. I replied I had sent them. He saw that the 
crisis had come, and went to the school. He found the 
three boys on the steps outside. They had been refused 
admittance even to the veranda. 

Taking hold of the hands of the boys, to show that 
he was not afraid of pollution, he walked into the school 
with them. Before all, with the intention that it should 
be reported over the town, he talked indignantly to the 
headmaster, and told him that the government required 
of its teachers that they should be enlightened men. He 
did then what he must have known from his long ex- 
perience in the country was too extreme a measure: he 
made the Christian boys look over into the same books 
as the Hindu boys, reading with them, and touching 
them. He wanted the Hindus to see how harmless the 
touch was; for these Christian boys were as clean and 
bright as they. I heard of it all and realized that Judge 



EDUCATION FOR AN ILLITERATE PEOPLE 121 

Sharp had played at high stakes. There could be no 
halfway result; it was either win or lose. My diary 
says: "The good Lord can work marvelous changes if 
he please. The end will be right no doubt.'* The next 
day, September 25, 1867, has the following entry: "The 
Brahman boys have all left the school, so I hear, and 
now only thirteen in all remain. Yesterday morning 
there were over sixty in daily attendance.'' I say nothing 
more. There my diary ends. No diary was kept during 
all the year that was now before me. 

Thus I found myself defeated. Still I was not going 
to submit. I opened an Anglo-vernacular school. I en- 
gaged a teacher and was going to make it a permanent 
institution. But before two years had passed, the con- 
verts were coming by the hundred, all as ignorant as 
possible. We felt under great pressure to provide a 
staff of workers by a short process of training. It split 
up our energies to conduct a school aiming solely at 
preparation for a high school course. At that juncture 
we had to make evangelization our aim, and education 
had to have for its object a speedy preparation of native 
agency. Quantity was wanted just then; we could not 
wait for quality. I closed that Anglo-vernacular school. 
We put all our strength into Mrs. Clough's normal 
school, and we obtained what we sought: a large staff 
of workers. 

Yet, take it altogether, I think that defeat was a 
serious loss to us. We ought to have had well-educated 
men right through the years. It crippled us at just that 
point in our development. We lost twelve years or more 
in our advance in educational development, and I do not 
know whether we ever caught up. If that government 
school had educated a nucleus of boys for us who would 
have been ready for our high school when we did open 
one, everything would have fallen into line. As it was. 



122 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

we had scarcely a boy ready for high school classes when 
we began such a school in 1880. A controversy then 
broke out in the mission. Over no question from begin- 
ning to end have I had such serious trouble as over the 
question of the higher education of our Christians, and 
it began in that defeat in September, 1867. 

As for those Brahmans, there came another day, nearly 
twenty years later, when I opened a high school in On- 
gole for our Christian boys, and allowed the caste boys 
to come to it, on payment of tuition fees. All went well 
till a Christian boy was ready to enter the highest class. 
Then the Brahman boys in it protested and left the 
school and took most of the other caste boys with them. 
It was a stampede once more. I sent out word that if 
the Brahman boys did not wish to recite with the Chris- 
tian boys, they could stay away, the school would con- 
tinue just the same. They came back. By the time an- 
other ten years had passed, a still greater change had 
come over Ongole public opinion. A deputation of the 
leading Brahmans of Ongole addressed a petition to our 
missionary board in Boston, asking them to found a 
college in Ongole where they knew our Christian lads 
would sit side by side on the same benches with their 
own sons. 

It was a long road which I traveled between Judge 
Sharp's well-meant attempt in 1867 and the founding 
of the Ongole College in 1893. I^ meant twenty-six 
years of hard work. 



A CRISIS AND MY ORDERS 

That episode of our attempt to raise the status of the 
Madigas by claiming for them the educational advan- 
tages granted to all, theoretically, by the government, 
became known over all that region.- If thus far it had 
been merely a matter of comment that only Madigas 
were joining our mission, it now became a settled fact. 
I had done something which practically locked the door 
behind me. I could not retreat. Public opinion had 
spoken a decisive word. I did not at the time see it in 
all its bearings. But the die was cast. Ours was hence- 
forth a Madiga mission. I becam.e the **Madiga Dhora." 

I was sustained at that time by the zeal with which 
the outcaste came flocking to us. It did me good to 
see how thirsty they were for the message of salvation, 
and how gladly they believed in Jesus. They crowded 
to our Sunday services. Our sitting room was soon too 
small. The veranda too was filled to overflowing. It 
was well that I had determined, even before we left Nel- 
lore, that we must have a chapel. We wanted it in the 
compound, facing the road. During the week it was to 
serve as schoolhouse. I could not wait to get the money 
from America. A spirit of giving and self-denial was 
abroad among us. Generous subscriptions came from the 
English officials of the district. A wealthy deacon in the 
Madras Baptist church gave a liberal sum. The rest was 

123 



124 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

made up in small gifts. I gave much attention to the 
building of it, and kept the expense down to about 
$1,000. It was large enough to seat several hundred peo- 
ple. Ten years later I enlarged it, and thus it still 
stands. Before the doors and windows were in, or the 
floor was laid, we held our services in it. I preached the 
dedication sermon on October 13, 1868, from the text 
"Prepare to meet thy God," Amos 4:12. 

I had lost interest in writing a diary. I thought the 
future held nothing in store that would be worth writing 
about. Now and then I noted down incidents that struck 
me as important, dealing with bare facts, like mile-stones 
in my own experience. It was all in the way of adjust- 
ing myself to the social institutions of the people. 

Everywhere I was confronted by the powerful grip 
in which caste was holding everyone. One day, as I 
passed through the bazaar of Ongole, I saw an elderly 
woman lying in a ditch by the road, uncared for, in con- 
vulsions. I procured a mat, placed her on it, and did 
what I could for her. I inquired whether there was no 
one belonging to this woman. She had a brother living 
in Ongole and a daughter ten miles away. I sent her 
a message that her mother was dying. Neither she nor 
the brother dared come near her. She had been out of 
her mind for some days, had wandered here and there 
and broken caste. To let her die in their home would 
have meant expense for purifying ceremonies after- 
wards; for the people of their caste would avoid them. 
I was indignant. I saw that even family relationship 
and the sacredness of death were as nothing in com- 
parison to caste. 

Another day, as I was passing the Brahman rest- 
house of Ongole, a man lying on the veranda called to 
me in distress. I went to him. He was a Brahman 
pilgrim, on his way to the temple at Tripati for merit 



A CRISIS AND MY ORDERS 12$ 

Sick when he arrived, the Brahmans living near the 
rest-house took for granted that he had already broken 
caste, and did not come near him. Some friendly Sudras 
had offered him food but he was bound to refuse it. He 
was now dying. His caste rules allowed him to take 
medicine from me. The next day he refused that also; 
he shut his teeth tight, as I held it to his lips. Over 
night he died in great misery. The man had starved 
to death rather than break his caste. 

Then I learned how the English officials were obliged 
to reckon with the prejudices of the native people. They 
learned by bitter experience and passed the knowledge on 
to each other. One of them took me into his confidence. 
He owned a horse, a fine animal. It was stricken with 
disease, and could not eat nor stand. As he was leav- 
ing Ongole he wanted me to take charge of it, and 
placed a liberal sum in my hands to pay for the horse's 
keeper, and for the best medical treatment to be had. I 
was to buy everything needful for the horse until it 
died. By way of explanation, he intimated to me that 
if he shot the animal the hostility of the native com- 
munity would follow him to the next place, though 
far away. Letters would be written to his superiors, 
charging him with deeds he had not done. The of- 
ficials under him in the next place would become in- 
formed, and turn against him. To see an Englishman 
thus avoid future trouble was a revelation to me. I 
promised him that I would take care of his horse. Then 
I listened to the comments of the people. They talked 
of the horse as an intelligent animal, with the courage 
of a man; they suggested that, perhaps, the nature of 
some one of noble achievement, who died prematurely, 
might now be dwelling in the horse, and it was well that 
time was given it to die in its own way. I wondered 
about it all. 



126 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Then something more was forced upon my attention. 
Several Madigas of low type came to bargain with me 
for the horse. They wanted it for purposes of food, and 
offered to pay as much as one of them could earn in a 
month, if I agreed to sell. I asked questions till I knew 
how they viewed the subject. Then I refused. They 
were angry and felt I had deprived them unreasonably 
of something they wanted. I had heard that the Madigas 
were carrion-eaters. It is one thing to hear; it is an- 
other thing to come upon the actual fact. I had gone 
to a Madiga hamlet of. Ongole often, in the hope of 
working a change. It was one of the worst of the 
kind. Sometimes I could not remain. One afternoon I 
saw them gathered together over something that in- 
terested them. They scattered when they saw me com- 
ing. Some were angry; some were ashamed. I went 
home and no one knows how disgusted I felt, and how 
sick at heart. 

I saw that in all fairness I could not blame the caste 
people when they gave me to understand that if I re- 
ceived the Madigas all the rest would hold aloof. If I, 
with all my Christian feeling of the brotherhood of 
man, felt the tension, how could I ask them to overlook 
the social disability of the Madigas ? Was there no way 
out of this ? How had it come about that these outcaste 
people were in such abject condition? They had been 
held in it for many centuries. No one thought any- 
thing else possible for them. 

These prejudices were due to a historical sequence 
of events. The Brahmans sometimes say that we Amer- 
icans exterminate the aboriginal tribes whom we find in 
possession of the soil, and that then we come over to 
India and blame them for the way they treat their 
Pariah tribes. They claim they did better than we; 
they at least allowed them to live, and left them a place 



A CRISIS AND MY ORDERS I27 

in their community, even though it was a humble place. 
Perhaps this charge is not wholly unjust. There is a 
chapter in our history of which we Americans say as 
little as possible when we face Asiatics. Men hunt each 
other down like wolves when the course of events offers 
them the opportunity. 

In the India of prehistoric times, the Pariah tribes of 
to-day probably dwelt at a low stage of human develop- 
ment. It is a matter of conjecture whether they be- 
longed to early migrations of the Dravidians, or whether 
they were pre-Dravidian. They were there when the 
Dravidians came into South India, perhaps from the 
lost continent Lemuria. There may have been inter- 
tribal wars; there may have been amicable settlement. 
The Sudras of to-day, who are the prosperous farmers 
of the country, stand for the bulk of the Dravidian stock. 
The relation between the Sudras and the Pariahs is down 
to the present time on a paternal, protective basis. It 
points to a time when all had their place in the com- 
munity, cooperating in mutual service, and none was 
despised. Madiga families for generations served the 
same Sudra family. Marriage in the Madiga family was 
delayed till the Sudra masters celebrated one. The 
Madigas dwelt in a hamlet by themselves, as the Sudras 
found them when they came into the land. But they 
were allowed to come into the courtyard of the Sudra 
home, to transact business. 

The element of harshness came into the Madiga's life 
when the Brahmans came into South India, several thou- 
sand years ago. They were of Indo-Aryan stock and 
had come from Central Asia. They looked upon the 
Dravidians as inferior, though these Dravidians were 
a powerful people, governed by kings, supplied with 
ample wealth and resources. In different parts of the 
Dravidian country four cognate languages were spoken, 



128 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

of which the Telugu was one. Gradually the Brahmans 
became the teachers of the people; they became advisers 
to the Dravidian kings. The caste system, which they 
brought with them, spread over South India. The Dra- 
vidians found a place in it. Castes and subcastes were 
evolved. Often a caste stood for a trade. Rigid lines 
of demarcation were drawn between these castes. They 
could not intermarry, nor eat together. On one point 
all castes were united : a gulf was fixed between them- 
selves and the outcastes. The Pariah tribes were left out- 
side. The English Government has created the term 
Panchama, meaning fifth caste, in order to give the 
Pariah population a social standing. Since there was no 
place for them in the four great castes of India, they 
enter in as a caste by themselves. 

This is only one sign of many, indicating the change 
which has come since I began my work in India. The 
Madigas, as I found them, were in a condition almost of 
serfdom. In the communal life of the village, they not 
only did the leather work, which to the caste people 
meant pollution, they did everything else that others did 
not want to do. They were the scavengers of the village. 
They had to bear burdens from place to place. They 
were oppressed and downtrodden and there was no one 
to help them. 

I saw that it had come to this : If I continued to re- 
ceive the Madigas I would have to identify myself with 
them. Their sorrows would be laid upon me. The hard- 
ships of their position would be mine to bear. Despised 
on their account, rejected by the other castes, I would 
have to begin at the bottom round of the ladder in India, 
and see about climbing up, carrying the Madigas with 
me. It all meant that a bitter cup was held to my lips, 
and that I would have to drink it to the dregs. If I had 
seen a way to do it honorably, I might have withdrawn 



1 



A CRISIS AND MY ORDERS I2g 

from Ongole. I think the sight of "Prayer Meeting 
Hill" had a good deal to do with making me stay on. 
If I was that man for Ongole, then I was elected to stay, 
come what might. The words of Dr. Colver rang in my 
ears, "Brother Clough, I believe that God from all eter- 
nity has chosen you to be a missionary to the Telugus.'* 
I wrote little to America during that year of the crisis, 
yet I must have had much that was good to report, for 
we baptized seventy-six during 1868. A draft in pencil 
of the following letter to Dr. Warren, dated June i, 
1868, is among my papers. Perhaps I did not send it to 
him, or perhaps he thought best to withhold it from 
print, because of its despondent tone. 

"I have allowed some of the native brethren, who for- 
merly belonged to the Madigas, to come into the house, to 
take the baby, and play with our little Allen, and do er- 
rands. I married two couples according to Christian cus- 
tom. Therefore many are angry. They tell me I am tear- 
ing down all the customs of their fathers. To show their 
anger, they have taken their children out of our little 
school, fifteen going in one day. They have tried to induce 
our gardener and the woman who helps Mrs. Clough to 
leave, threatening to beat or kill them if they did not leave 
us at once. 

"The story is also widely circulated that I am trying to 
get as many to believe as I can in order to send them all 
off to Europe, as soldiers, sailors, or slaves. This report 
works harm. A young man came in from his village some 
weeks ago and said he would be a Christian, and come back 
in a few days to be baptized. He came after a month and 
had a sad tale to tell. His own family had abused him be- 
cause he believed in the new religion. His wife's family 
had taken her from him, and would not let him have her 
again, lest she also be sent to Europe. 

"And so it is from day to day, and every day something 
new. We are in constant excitement. Our faith, ingenuity, 



130 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

and wisdom are frequently sadly tried. Here we are in 
the jungle, the great wilderness of heathenism all around 
us. To look back is of no use. We can only look up and 
go ahead, trusting in God to give us grace for every occa- 
sion. Thus far he has not disappointed us. We believe he 
will not." 



Six weeks after the above was written, fifty or sixty 
people were in the compound asking about Jesus the 
Christ. After much teaching, inquiry and prayer, four- 
teen were received and baptized. In the village of Co- 
pole, three miles from Ongole, there was a small lake 
which had been enlarged by digging. The village people 
washed their clothes in it and drove their cattle into 
it in hot weather to bathe and drink. We went there 
for the baptism, because there was no suitable place 
nearer to Ongole. Several hundred people had come 
out from the village, and stood on the high bank of 
the lake. They saw me give a sacred ordinance of my 
religion to people whom they scarcely allowed to come 
within ten feet of them. They pointed at me with de- 
rision. Abusive words fell from their lips. They said 
among themselves that they would sue me for defiling 
the water of their lake by immersing these low people 
into it. They afterwards sent me a message that they 
would beat me and those who came with me, if we dared 
to repeat this. 

Thus reviled and threatened with violence, I had at 
the same time to fight, almost, to keep some deluded 
ones from worshiping me. Afterwards I took it all 
with equanimity. Between attempts made to kill me and 
attempts to worship me, God helped me to keep my head 
level. But now, during the year of the crisis, I took 
it hard. I wanted to go away and see no more of it. 
In a letter to Boston, September 29, 1868, I related the 



A CRISIS AND MY ORDERS I3I 

case of a woman who told the preachers that she had 
heard about the Lord Jesus some time ago from Periah, 
who had passed through her village. She made a vow 
that if her daughter, who was sick at the time recovered, 
she would believe in him and worship him. Her daugh- 
ter was well, and was now in Ongole with her, and she 
therefore believed. The preachers felt some mistrust. 
They asked, "Where is Jesus Christ?" To my astonish- 
ment and horror, the old woman turning around, pointed 
her finger at me and said, "He is Jesus Christ, and for 
six months I have believed in him and prayed to him." 

"I might enumerate similar instances, plenty of them, 
but to write out this one, according to facts, makes me 
shudder. . . . Like the great missionary to the Gentiles and 
his companion, who rent their clothes (Acts 14:14), such 
scenes make me feel very sad and sick at heart ; and, while 
I exclaim, 'Sirs, why do ye these things? We are also men 
of like passions with you, and preach unto you that you 
should turn from these vanities and serve the living God' — 
the feeling creeps over me that I should like to flee from 
such scenes to a country where I should never see them re- 
peated. But, of course, these feelings give way to better 
ones, sent by the Comforter." 

I came close to having good cause for going home 
during that year of the crisis. While out on tour in 
Podili, I had a severe attack of jungle fever. With dif- 
ficulty I made the journey of thirty miles back to Ongole. 
For a time I thought a decisive word had been spoken, 
and that my work in India had thus come to an end. 
But I recovered. 

The year dragged on. It was a continual question in 
my mind : Did I do right in admitting those Madigas ? 
Could I have entered into some kind of compromise? 
But I was too democratic for a compromise. It would 



132 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

have been against my religious convictions. I received 
these Christians from the Madigas with open arms, as 
fellow Christians and brethren in the Lord. 

I was evidently not sure of my ground even toward 
the end of 1868. Our third man, Rev. A. V. Timpany, 
with his wife, was in Nellore, learning the Telugu lan- 
guage. I wrote to him that I wished we had some great 
Baptist authority within reach, who could weigh the 
situation and tell us whether it is right to baptize one 
class of people, when that forms a barrier to all the rest. 
An old letter from him is among my papers, dated No- 
vember 5, 1868, in which he refers to this. 

"I rejoice with you in your joys and sympathize with 
you in your trials. Go on baptizing, brother, those 'elect of 
God.' A converted Madiga is as good as, and, if more 
pious, better, in the eye of God than a converted Brahman. 
God knows best how to work. He is working from the 
bottom upward. According to our faith be it unto us. Hard 
times you have. Brother Clough. Glad of it. Anything but 
stagnation. We have no one here to decide on 'Principles 
and Practices' except ourselves, but we, too, are 'titled' men, 
and can serve till greater ones come." 

Mrs. Clough had carried her share of the disappoint- 
ment which had oppressed us all that year. Not only as 
it affected me, but in her own activities she realized how 
much was at stake. If her school was to have none but 
Madiga pupils, and the staff of mission helpers was to be 
wholly composed of Madigas, her expectation of the kind 
of work she wanted to build up was bound to be lowered 
considerably. We kept our house open and were ac- 
cessible to the people, and let them "come near," and 
get glimpses of our home life. If that stream of visitors 
was to dwindle down to Madigas, mostly, it would make 
a difference with her, too. We had been carrying this 



A CRISIS AND MY ORDERS 133 

load together, and were now jointly given an assurance 
that what we had done was right. We received what 
was to us a direct command from God to continue in 
our course. 

One Sunday evening I was sitting in my study with 
a weight on my soul that seemed insupportably heavy. 
I had been out in Copole again, baptizing a group of 
Madigas. Several hundred caste people had stood on 
the bank as before, with threatening looks expressing 
their contempt. It had come to be a situation from 
which I could not retreat, nor was I willing to go ahead. 

In a corner of my study there was a pile of about three 
hundred new Bibles, recently sent by my order from 
the Bible Society in Madras. English soldiers at that 
time frequently passed through Ongole, on their way 
between Madras and Hyderabad. They invariably came 
to our mission house, and I had the custom of giving 
each one an English Bible to take away with him. Sim- 
ply by way of diverting my thoughts, I went to this pile 
of Bibles, picked up one of them, and aimlessly let it 
fall open of its own accord. I was startled to find before 
my eyes the wonderful words of the Apostle Paul, I 
Corinthians i : 26-29 : 

"For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many 
wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, 
are called: 

"But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to 
confound the wise ; and God hath chosen the weak things 
of the world to confound the things which are mighty ; 

"And base things of the world, and things which are 
despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, 
to bring to naught the things that are ; that no flesh should 
glory in his presence." 

The impression made upon me, as I read these words, 
was profound. It seemed like a voice from heaven. An 



134 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

experience had come to me like unto that of the Apostle 
Peter, when, on the house-top, in a vision, a sheet full of 
unclean, creeping things came down before him, and he 
was told to arise and eat. The centurion, Cornelius, was 
even then knocking at his door, and with him the whole 
pagan world. The Apostle Peter wanted the Jews to 
believe in the Jesus whom they had crucified. In his 
Jewish exclusiveness he looked with aversion upon the 
coming of the Gentiles. He had been wrestling with 
the question; for he knew that if the lower classes of 
the Gentiles pressed into the kingdom, the higher classes 
of the Jews would hold aloof. He now obeyed. The 
church at Jerusalem called him to account, and when 
he explained to them how God spoke to him in a vision, 
"they held their peace, and glorified God." Thus did I 
have to reconcile American Baptists to that which was 
done in their Telugu Mission. The result in both cases 
was that the common people came gladly. 

While sitting deep in thought, trying to adjust myself 
to the new point of view, Mrs. Clough came into the 
room. She had put our two children to sleep. Before 
she sat down, she went to that pile of Bibles, picked up 
one, and let it open where it would. She stopped in her 
reading, and remarked, "It seems to be God's plan to 
save these outcastes first." I was amazed. I sat near 
enough to her to see that her Bible had opened to the 
same place as mine. It was not the same book; for 
mine was still open before me. I asked her what led 
her to this conclusion. She said it weighed on her mind 
that more Madigas had been baptized that day ; she knew 
what the effect would be. In order somehow to get 
comfort and courage, she had gone to that pile of Bibles 
and had picked up the nearest one, and had opened it at 
random. Here were the verses. 

I told her what my experience had been. It made no 



A CRISIS AND MY ORDERS 1 35 

difference to us that these Bibles were all recently bound, 
and that, perhaps, all would open to the same place. 
The great luminous fact to us both was, that we, inde- 
pendently of each other, in the same manner, and almost 
at the same time, had received the same word of com- 
mand. God had spoken to us. From that moment our 
doubts were gone. We believed that these poor, de- 
graded Madigas were sent to us. We had our orders to 
go to the most despised class in India and bring them to 
the Lord Jesus. We went ahead, thereafter, nothing 
doubting. 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 

The year 1869 was a great year in our history. The 
converts had been coming in tens; they now began to 
come in hundreds. Nine years later was the day of 
thousands. 

I had shaken myself free from the fetters of doubt 
and disappointment which had weighed me down, and 
was ready now for anything. Believers, in small com- 
panies, were constantly being brought by the preachers 
into Ongole. I let them feel that their desire to follow 
my Master Jesus was precious to me. The call came 
from one village after another for my presence. I fol- 
lowed eagerly every call. Wherever there was a vil- 
lage where they were asking about Jesus, that was the 
village where I wanted to go. No matter about the 
hardship, I went — roads or no roads. 

A movement was in progress among the Madigas. 
We were all hard at work. The helpers, who had come 
from Nellore with us, were full of zeal. Obulu, who 
had prayed in his hut in the corner of our compound 
for many years, was going far and near as colporter. 
He was a Mala and could reach the Malas. Some came, 
but they remained few in number. It was a tribal move- 
ment. Word went over the land that a great salvation 
had come to the Madigas. Periah and Paul were tire- 
lessly going from one taluk to another. Given a band 

136 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 137 

of workers like ours, something was bound to be 
achieved. But our output of effort could not at all 
adequately account for the results achieved. It was as 
if the fuel had been lying ready, and we needed only 
to strike the light; the flame spread of itself. In my 
report for 1868 I stated: 

"It is evident to me that the Madigas are given to Christ, 
and that the time is near when thousands of them will be- 
lieve to the saving of the soul. To see how they drink in 
the words about Jesus would do you good. While preach- 
ing to those poor people many times have the words of the 
Master come to my mind : 'Say not ye, there are yet four 
months and then cometh harvest? Behold, I say unto you, 
lift up your eyes, and look on the fields ; for they are white 
already to harvest.' These Madigas have not many preju- 
dices to overcome, and not much property to lose if they 
become Christians, but it requires just as much of a miracle 
to regenerate one man as another, and in any case it is 
nothing short of a miracle" 

In a cool, clear survey of the field, and speaking only 
of the immediate future, I could point to the ingather- 
ing that was already in sight. We were laying the 
foundations at that time. If the work of those first years 
had been less solid, if it had been the work of any 
one man, or any group of men, and the Lord Jesus had 
not been in it, the whole subsequent structure would 
have fallen into ruins. 

We began the year 1869 with a week of prayer. Mr. 
and Mrs. Timpany were visiting us, deeply interested in 
seeing the people athirst for the tidings of Jesus. Mr. 
Timpany wrote to Dr. Warren at that time: "Send us 
men and means and by the help of our Master we will 
gather this people by the thousands." On the first Sun- 
day of his stay twenty-three came to our morning serv- 



138 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

ice, asking baptism. He joined us in spending three 
hours that afternoon with those inquirers. We listened 
to their own experience; we heard them tell how they 
believed in Jesus as their Saviour and desired to give up 
their old life for the new. In every case there was some 
one who knew them, who had taught them all they had 
learned of the new religion, and who now stood ready 
to bear testimony. Evidence of newness of life was 
easily detected in the simple lives they led. Often there 
was a look in the eyes that told the whole story. Out 
of those twenty-three, twelve were received ; for the rest 
arrangements were made that they might receive fur- 
ther instruction. 

There was an urgent call out to the Kanigiri taluk. 
It was now a year since the baptism of the twenty-eight 
at Tallakondapaud. Periah had been bringing converts 
from this taluk with him to Ongole for baptism all 
through the year. By this time there was probably not 
a Madiga in all that taluk who had not heard about 
Jesus Christ. Mr. Timpany went with me on this 
tour. He was the first eye-witness to the work now in 
progress. Many a man in the course of the years did 
I take touring with me, none more heart and soul with 
me than he. The Telugu language was still new to him, 
but there was much for his eyes to see. The people 
were expecting us everywhere. When we passed through 
villages, they came out to the road to see us and hear 
us. Where we pitched our tent we had no lack of 
listeners. Everybody was in a receptive mood. We told 
the people the story of Jesus. They listened, and as- 
sented. They said they believed in him, but wanted to 
learn more. 

Mr. Timpany, as he looked on, counted more than one 
hundred during our tour with whom assent had grown 
into conviction. In this he was largely guided by the 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 139 

bearing of the people; for he could only partly follow 
the drift of conversation. He had helped in revivals 
in America. The look on a white man's face, when 
in his soul is performed that act which we call conver- 
sion, is like the look in the face of even the humblest 
Asiatic when he says he believes in Jesus, the Saviour, 
and will follow him. We stayed several days in the 
grove near Tallakondapaud. More than fifty people had 
come from surrounding villages, bringing provisions 
with them, determined to stay as long as we stayed. 
Everything that was said and done was of importance 
to them. Life had taken on a new meaning. There 
were twenty-six asking baptism, of whom sixteen were 
received. 

The movement had had its beginning in the Kanigiri 
taluk. It soon spread to the Podili taluk adjoining it. 
There were in this taluk several Madiga families inter- 
related, which stood above the average. They were 
thrifty. Their huts were of ample size and kept in good 
repair. They had a few crude pieces of furniture with 
the needed cooking utensils. Each member of the 
family had a suit of clothes to wear, and something for 
extra occasions. There were a few head of cattle, and 
a few acres of land. They were attached to some Sudra 
families and helped to cultivate their fields, for which 
they received their portion of grain at harvest time. 
They also did leather work. It was possible for them 
now and then to make an outlay of money for religious 
purposes. 

Along the line of religious devotion they had found 
advancement in their social status also. They still kept 
up the village worship, bowing before the idols set up 
under the trees here and there and bringing gifts. All 
castes thought it well to do this. In addition they had 
for a number of years received teaching from wandering 



I40 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Gurus, who were followers of the Yogi Nasriah. They 
had learned from them to sing hymns and recite verses 
that had mystical meaning. It was contact for them 
with an Indian reform movement which had a tendency 
to uplift them both religiously and socially. 

The Yogi Nasriah had wielded a strong influence for 
good over all that region. He was a Mohammedan ; his 
name Nasr was given the Telugu ending, and the people 
called him Nasriah. In his early years he had received 
from a Yogi an initiation of an unusual order. Stories 
were told of his supernormal powers, and the people 
greatly revered him. Some wealthy caste people, who 
had confidence in him as a Yogi, built him a temple at 
Tiprantakamu in the Markapur taluk. They hoped thus 
to obtain salvation for their souls. In this temple 
Nasriah lived as an ascetic. People from far and near 
came to him, and he taught them. In a simple way 
which all could understand, he told them that there is 
one God, and he is Spirit. He gave them an ethical code 
similar to the Christian code. He forbade idol-worship. 

Nasriah frowned on caste. He received all who came, 
regardless of caste or sex or creed. As is customary 
with a Yogi, he had a group of disciples to whom he 
gave the inner teaching which is guarded by initiations. 
There were many also who were coming and going, who 
gathered something of the teaching and then went over 
the country giving it out to the people in return for 
gifts. Men of this kind were available to the Madigas 
as Gurus, and they were glad to learn from them. It 
was better than anything they had previously known. 
After Nasriah's death, which probably occurred about 
the year 1825, his followers became corrupt. He was no 
longer there to rebuke them. They grew lax in ethical 
precepts; they used intoxicants; they resorted to hemp 
in order to produce trance conditions. Idol-worship was 



COMING BY HUNDREDS I4I 

permitted. Notwithstanding the decline in the original 
strength of Nasriah's movement, it endured, and still 
stands for something that is higher than the polytheism 
of the Indian village. 

It is said that Nasriah received a Madiga as disciple, 
initiated him, and then sent him out to teach his people. 
No one knows of this with certainty. But it is a fact 
that there was a large contingent of Madigas in Nasriah's 
movement; some said a thousand, some said less. They 
were to be found in all the region where the Christian 
movement afterwards spread with great rapidity. Nas- 
riah had done preliminary work with the Madigas. He 
gave them a place when they came to the annual feast 
at Tiprantakamu. In groups, families together, they 
came, walking many miles. Their gifts of rice, fowls 
and spices were accepted. They were seated a little to 
one side in the temple court, when the time for the feast 
came, but they were given to eat of the same food, boiled 
in the same pot from which the rest received. It was 
a great advance for them in the social scale. 

The Madiga followers of Nasriah only needed to hear 
of Christianity and they wanted to know more. The 
seeds of social revolution had been sown among them 
by Nasriah. It remained to Christianity to make the 
application. They had revered the personality of Nas- 
riah. They now turned to Jesus with a devotion that 
made them fearless of suffering. At Tiprantakamu it 
was noticed that the Madigas had ceased to come to 
the annual feast. It was now many years since Nasriah 
had died, yet no one had dared dispute with the Madigas 
the place he had given them. Perhaps those in authority 
at the temple were glad when they ceased to come. They 
said : "What can we do to hold them? They are follow- 
ing a new religion. Let them go." We had three thou- 
sand members when the ingathering came. Of these a 



142 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

large proportion had called themselves Nasriah people. 
The Christian movement absorbed the spiritual strength 
which had been generated by that Indian reform move- 
ment. It was taken over from one to the other, un- 
sought, by a natural process of spiritual growth. 
- Those interrelated Madiga families in the Podili taluk 
were all Nasriah people. Their attention was aroused by 
rumors which were passed along about a new religion. 
They were glad when Bezwada Paul came to them. He 
was a kinsman, and though not a Nasriah man, he 
had been on the path of Yoga, and spoke the language. 
When they listened to him, far into the night, as he 
told about Jesus Christ, his life and death, and when 
they knelt with him when he prayed to his Father in 
heaven, they felt they had never known anything like this 
before. The younger men said among themselves : "Why 
should we go on as heretofore? We have spent much 
on Gurus. What salvation have they given us? Let 
us go to Ongole." They were ready for action. It 
seemed to them that a great day had dawned. 

The aged father of the Thaluri family, a patriarch 
among them all, asked them to take time to consider. 
He reminded them that they had not been without re- 
ligious zeal in the past. Moreover, he had a daughter, 
who became a widow when a child. She had taken com- 
fort in the teaching of Nasriah, singing the hymns. A 
woman now, of mature years, she went about, teaching 
and singing, serving God. She was dear to the old 
man, and he insisted that she must be consulted, for had 
she not more piety than they all? One of the sons, 
Thaluri Daniel, afterwards a valuable man as Christian 
preacher, was restless ; the sister was at a distant village. 
He walked two days to reach her. She said: *T have 
heard of this religion. It is well that you have the desire 
to go to Ongole. Do not wait for me. Soon I shall re- 



COMING BY HUNDREDS I43 

turn home, and then I, too, shall make known my faith 
in Jesus Christ.'* The whole family came to us. 

In the Darsi taluk, adjoining Podili, there was a man, 
Sreeram Solomon, who had for years been a Nasriah 
man, but while north, trading in hides, he had heard of 
the Christian religion. He had made a compromise : he 
still sang Nasriah hymns, but he prayed as he had seen 
Vongole Abraham, the Christian trader, pray, and with 
the words he had used. Filled with curiosity to see the 
white Dhora in Ongole, he came. He arranged with 
Obulu to help him sell tracts as he went on trade. Obulu 
brought him to me. He said : "This man is not yet a 
Christian, yet he offers to sell tracts. He has learned to 
read a little." I liked the man. He was straightforward 
and sincere in manner, and evidently resourceful beyond 
the average. Ere long he was baptized. I asked him to 
come to our school. He said he would come, but his 
prosperity as trader was attractive to him ; he held back. 

One day he came to my veranda while I was talking 
with the people, and said salaam to me. I asked him how 
he had been faring, and he proudly showed me thirty 
rupees, rolled in a red cloth, just received for a bandy- 
load of goatskins. I took the money and said : "This is 
the fine for your wavering words. Four times you have 
"promised you would come to our school, and you have 
not come. Salaam.'' I continued speaking to the people. 
He stood there. It was a crisis in his life. He asked for 
his money. I took him by the shoulder and gave him a 
kindly shake. After that he had a feeling of nearness 
to me that helped him much in his decision. I said, 
"Here is your money. Will you come to school?" "I 
will come." This man was afterward the leading preacher 
in the Darsi taluk. The people gathered round him. The 
time came when there were several thousand Christians in 
that taluk. 



144 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

The spread of Christianity in those early years was 
very rapid. The wave now, during 1869, was going 
north to three taluks which I had not thus far regarded 
as my field. I had confined myself in my tours to the 
Kanigiri, Podili and Darsi taluks southwest of Ongole. 
A government engineer had been stationed at Ongole for 
a short time and had been baptized by me. He was now 
in those three northern taluks, building bridges and re- 
pairing roads. Thousands of coolies were employed 
under him, and he called for two men to preach to them, 
promising their support. I sent one man without delay. 
Then I saw how Baddepudy Abraham, though still in 
school, showed distinct ability as an evangelist; for I 
took him out on tour with me and found him valuable. 
I asked him whether he felt a call to those northern 
taluks — they were a hundred miles away from his home. 
He said he wanted to go. It was the beginning of a 
great work. During the ingathering more than three 
thousand from that region were baptized. In 1883, when 
those three taluks, Vinukonda, Nursarvupet and Ba- 
patala, were made separate mission fields, the new mis- 
sionaries all wanted Abraham. He had to divide his 
time and serve as before. The man had become part of 
the, religious life in three taluks — the people could not 
give him up. 

Early in 1869 a beginning was made in the two taluks 
west of Ongole, Cumbum and Markapur, under circum- 
stances of so unusual a nature that the result was far- 
reaching. The first clash between the old order and the 
new took place in those taluks. Persecution broke out. 
The people suffered for Jesus* sake, and far from being 
intimidated thereby they rose out of it stronger than 
before, and "many were added unto them," as in New 
Testament times. 

Periah and Paul were distantly related to some Madiga 



COMING BY HUNDREDS . 145 

families in those taluks. This gave them opportunity to 
enter everywhere. In the web of family life they were 
passed along from village to village. They were here 
close to the center of Nasriah's influence. The Nasriah 
people among the Madigas received them with open arms. 
Coming out of Raja Yoga teaching themselves, they 
framed their message to the people in a way that greatly 
appealed to them. 

Pcriah and Nagama made long tours together. The 
people loved them. The women were glad when Nagama 
taught them. Periah, the man of fifty, with long beard 
and patriarchal presence, the Guru-staff in his hand, made 
the men feel that there must be something substantial in 
this religion, or he would not be preaching it. Often he 
began his discourses with some of the metaphysical state- 
ments which he had used when he was a teacher of 
Yoga. It was an Eastern method and congenial to the 
minds of the people. They gave marked attention then 
to the story of Jesus which followed, told with great 
earnestness and power. 

Paul differed from Periah. He was still a young man. 
There was a bland, unworldly look in his face that made 
his family say when he was a child that he was going to 
be a sanyasi — a holy man or hermit. I tried to keep him 
in school, but he was restless. If I did not give him per- 
mission to go he went without it. He was possessed with 
the desire to go to every Madiga hamlet in all that region, 
omitting none. He wanted to stay long enough every- 
where to tell the people that a great salvation had been 
brought to India, and that no one now need go unsaved. 
Jesus Christ had died for men, even for Madigas. All 
that was needed was to believe in him, and to do as he 
had taught men to do. 

Somehow Paul kindled a fire wherever he went. 
When^ after some weeks of absence, he suddenly ap- 



14)6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

peared again in Ongole and told us where he had been 
and how the people had received his message, I could not 
reprove him for absenting himself suddenly from school. 
I found it necessary to follow in his track ; for the people 
whom he had met soon made themselves heard in their 
desire to know more of this salvation. If this was for 
them, they wanted it. My coming to Ongole was pro- 
claimed to the Madigas of all that region in a way wholly 
oriental by the two men, Periah and Paul. 

When they reached those two distant taluks they had 
an experience which was equaled nowhere else. Only 
faint rumors had preceded them of a white Dhora, staying 
at Ongole, who was sending two men everywhere telling 
of a new salvation. They judged of this in an oriental 
manner. It happens sometimes in India that a religious 
personality, generally an ascetic with a band of disciples, 
passes through some region on his way from one great 
temple to another. Sometimes he stays, teaching those 
who come, sometimes he moves on. The people are will- 
ing to walk long distances if they can come into contact, 
even once in a lifetime, with the bearer of a religious mes- 
sage or with his disciples. All this they applied to the 
tidings about me. Not until an increasing number of 
them had come to Ongole and had seen for themselves 
that I was there at home did they cease from their anx- 
iety that they might miss their chance. They said, "He 
has wife and children with him; he has come to stay." 
They saw that Periah and Paul were only making a be- 
ginning, and that I had men in school who would soon 
settle among them. After that they said, "We will wait 
till they come, and we can ask them more." 

In the meantime Periah and Paul had a strenuous time 
satisfying the people. During the night, when it was 
cool and there was no work to do, groups of listeners 
were formed. By the time the story of the life and death 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 147 

of Jesus Qirlst had been told in the hamlet where they 
were staying, fresh groups were arriving from neighbor- 
ing hamlets. They, too, wanted to hear all from the 
beginning ; for it seemed to them that by just hearing and 
believing they could be saved. If, worn out, as morning 
dawned, the preacher slept, they kept a man on guard 
near by to prevent him from rising up and going away 
silently and suddenly as is the custom of Hindu Gurus. 
It took several days to satisfy the people in a group of 
hamlets that they had now heard all that was needed in 
order to be saved. By that time messengers sent by the 
village elders of other hamlets were waiting, with orders 
to bring the preacher, staying near by lest he go else- 
where. There was travail of soul in all that region. 

Everywhere the men were willing to let Periah or 
Paul cut off the juttti — the lock of hair on the top of the 
head which has religious significance. Sometimes a ma- 
jority of the men in a Madiga hamlet were ready for 
this, the elders among them. It was a decisive step that 
meant a break with the old forms of worship. The wom- 
en were often bitterly opposed to it, yet they, too, had 
outward signs of an inward change. If they ceased to 
mark their foreheads to show that they had bowed before 
the idols, it could bring them great trouble. The caste 
people took note. When the juttus were gone, and the 
marks on the foreheads were missing, it was often the 
signal for petty persecution. 

In his wanderings in the Markapur taluk, Paul heard 
of a man who was praying to a new God, and was there- 
fore at variance with his family. He went there. He 
found the man, Vidulala Jonah, who told him that he 
had been north on trade and had met Vongole Abraham. 
From him he had learned about Jesus Christ. After his 
return home he had knelt and prayed as he had seen the 
Christians do. His mother had seen him, and had laughed 



148 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

at him, and asked, "What new thing is this ?" She was 
a Matangi. When Jonah, her eldest son, was three years 
old, she showed signs of possession. Out in the field, at 
work, she looked this way and that, and talked to herself, 
and refused to eat. As her grandmother had been a 
Matangi, it was thought that the power must have reap- 
peared in her. 

The simple story of the Christ had here brought "not 
peace, but a sword" into a family where possession was 
hereditary. The whole taluk was botmd to hear of it; 
because this woman was their only Matangi ; she had no 
rival. It touched the Madiga community near its heart ; 
for the Matangi cult distinctly belongs to the Madigas. 
However much other castes may take an interest in it, 
and share in it as something that may concern them, the 
leading figure in the cult must always be a Madiga wom- 
an. The supposition is that the Matangi is overshadowed 
by Ellama, one of the ten great Saktis of India, a form 
of Parvati, the consort of the god Siva. Ellama is to 
find expression through the Matangi. Great care is taken 
when a Madiga woman shows signs of possession, to as- 
certain whether it is genuine or spurious. One who is 
already a Matangi is sent for, sometimes from a dis- 
tance, to make tests, and then to initiate the new Ma- 
tangi into the rites of her office. 

All this had been done in the case of Jonah^s mother 
many years before. Since then she had gone about the 
taluk, her husband going with her, performing the sacri- 
ficial rites of the Matangi. Not Madigas only surrounded 
her when she poured buttermilk upon a bunch of Margosa 
leaves and sprinkled the bystanders with it; caste peo- 
ple also stood there. All believed in mother-worship in 
some form. If by the signs of her possession this Ma- 
tangi gave even slight evidence that the power of Ellama 
was in her, they were anxious to cojue in contact with it 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 149 

It might save them from the evil within them and with- 
out ; for motherhood is a potent force. 

Hard days came to Jonah when he now declared his 
intention to enter that new religion. Paul had remained 
in the neighborhood, and many had listened to him and 
had admitted that it would be better for them if they 
could walk in this new path. The time came for Paul to 
return to Ongole. Jonah went with him. He wanted 
baptism and was ready to face the outcome. It meant a 
break with his family. Looking ahead, if his family 
should ultimately come with him it meant that they would 
lose a lucrative pursuit that gave them some standing in 
the taluk. After the baptism Jonah returned home and 
was treated by his parents as one hated. They refused 
to let him sit with the rest at meal time. He bore this 
for a time ; then there came a day when he could bear no 
more. He said, *'I cannot be among you. I am going 
away to stay with the Christians." Now the strong tie of 
family relationship asserted itself. His mother missed 
him. He had been her chief support as Matangi. She 
tried to go about as usual, but it was all half-hearted. 
With an unwilling ear she had listened when they talked 
about the Lord Jesus. But she now found that she, too, 
was believing in him. With a younger son she went to 
the village where Jonah was staying. She asked him to 
come home. She told him she had grown tired of the 
Ellama worship and would join him in his new faith. 

It now became a question with Jonah what to do to 
satisfy the supporters of his mother. She stood in a kind 
of contract with them. They had assisted in the heavy 
expense of her initiation as Matangi many years before. 
If she now withdrew, their hold upon the power of El- 
lama ceased. If then disease came upon the people, and 
crops failed, and cattle died, the blame would be laid 
upon Jonah's family. A compromise was urged. 



150 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

At this juncture Paul came to help them. He was 
young for such responsible work. But he knew that he 
had us all with him. Moreover, among the followers of 
Yoga he had learned to look upon the Matangi cult as 
a low form of possession. Now, as a Christian, his cour- 
age was unbounded. He said to them, "Are you going 
wholly to become Christians, or are you going half and 
half? If you are true, give me the Matangi outfit to de- 
stroy." This was a serious matter to them. Jonah de- 
cided, with Paul there to help him, to call together the 
leading Matangi worshipers and lay the matter before 
them. He said before them all : "What we did in the 
Matangi worship was evil. We put much expense into 
it, but it is better that we should give up this than that 
we should lose the salvation of our souls. Let us turn 
from it all. Why should we keep the Matangi outfit? 
With your leave I will give it over to Paul." These 
straightforward words touched his hearers. They as- 
sented. They said, "You are the chief in this matter; 
for you are your father's eldest son. We will listen to 
your word." 

The insignia of the Matangi office were now handed 
over to Paul. He stood there before them all. First he 
broke into small pieces the long stick, emblem of serpent 
worship, which the Matangi holds in her hands. Next 
came the basket which, filled with Margosa leaves, she 
uses in her expiatory rites, remnant of ancient tree wor- 
ship. Paul tore this into shreds. Next he reached out 
for the pot containing the emblematical sea shells, sacred 
to Ellama worship. Now the people rose against him. 
They refused to let him touch the pot. Their anger had 
grown within them, and they were unwilling to witness 
further disrespect to their belief. The shells had been 
brought from the sea, which stands for the woman. If 
Ellama could commune with them through the shells they 



COMING BY HUNDREDS I5I 

were bound to hold them in high esteem. Often the 
Madigas built a hut in their hamlet, and there was noth- 
ing in it but a few pots containing sea shells. 

It was a square contest. Paul and Jonah stood on one 
side. The Matangi worshipers of the taluk stood on the 
other. Their anger was fierce for a day. Paul and Jonah 
were conciliatory, and talked to the people about the life 
and death of Jesus Christ. Soon they listened with an 
interest that made their old beliefs grow dim in their 
minds. They forgot their anger, and said among them- 
selves, "This is better than anything we have known." 
It all made a stir in the taluk. No one had thought it 
possible that such things could happen. The caste peo- 
ple heard of it, and wondered how it was going to affect 
them. Perhaps this was the reason why the Sudras and 
Brahmans of the taluk decided to hold a feast for the 
god Chinekaselu, a local deity, on the day of the full 
moon. 

The temple of this god was in the town Markapur, the 
place where the taluk officials resided. In the Madiga 
hamlet of the town there were now twelve Christians, 
four of whom were village elders. In the division of 
labor in the communal life of the town it fell to the Madi- 
gas to perform a part in the festivities. There was a 
large drum, iron on the sides and bottom, leather on top. 
No one could beat this drum but the Madigas, because the 
contact with the leather meant pollution. As the top was 
broken, the temple authorities sent a messenger to the 
Madigas to cover it with a new hide of the best kind. 
They were also to furnish men for the days of the festi- 
val to beat the smaller drums and to dance before the 
idol when it was taken in procession through the streets 
of the town. It was a test case perhaps purposely ar- 
ranged to see how far the Christians were prepared to go. 

They were now in a hard place. In the Matangi cult 



152 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

they had settled the question in their own way, because 
it was their own tribal cult ; but this new demand was a 
different matter. They would have tO' disengage them- 
selves suddenly from their old-time duties. There would 
be the caste people to face. It would mean much loss to 
them, not only by incurring the displeasure of their 
superiors, but because a temple festival was a lucrative 
time that always brought gain to the Madiga hamlet. 
However, they said to the messenger, "We are now 
Christians and cannot have anything to do with idol- 
worship." 

The karnam of Markapur, a Brahman, sent for those 
village elders. They held their ground. They told the 
karnam that they had learned that God had forbidden 
idol-worship, and as they had become Christians they 
must obey God's law. The karnam and the caste people 
looked upon it all as sheer insubordination, and decided 
upon coercive measures. One of the elders was known 
to have a hide in his hut, suitable for the drum. Con- 
stables were sent to get it, and to use force if necessary. 
The owner of the hide remonstrated and was severely 
beaten. Men who tried to help him were also beaten. 
The hide was carried off. 

There was an English magistrate in the adjoining 
taluk, and the Christians felt they must appeal to him. 
They laid the injured man on a light cot and had carried 
him just beyond Markapur, when the karnam sent con- 
stables to arrest them all, and put them in jail. Witnesses 
from the hamlet also were brought and locked into jail. 
There were sixteen men in all. It was a long, dark 
night. When morning dawned the women came and 
stood under the prison windows and cried. Jonah and 
another man, Onguri Abel, both afterwards ordained 
Christian preachers, were inside and were keeping up 
their own courage, and helping the rest. The man who 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 1 53 

had been beaten lay on the hard prison floor in great 
pain. One of the keepers was disposed to be kind. He 
allowed the wife of the man to hand steaming cloths 
through the window, so that Jonah and Abel could lay 
them on the bruises till the pain grew less. 

In the course of the day the men were taken before 
the submagistrate, a Brahman. Accusations were made 
against them falsely. Witnesses were brought forward 
for proof. The Christians had no means of defense and 
were sentenced to thirty days' imprisonment with hard 
labor. To add insult to their hardship they were set to 
work in the Vishnu temple grounds. Exposed thus to 
the jeers of bystanders, they were frequently asked: 
"How do you like being Christians? Will you learn to 
read now? We shall keep you here till your juttus 
grow again." It was in the hottest part of the year. 
The prison was only eighteen by forty feet in size, cov- 
ered with a low, flat roof, the door was kept locked, and 
there were but three small windows. The ground was 
overrun with insects. Only twice a day the keeper gave 
the prisoners water to drink. It was misery enough to 
test the faith of the strongest. 

When they were thrown into jail Jonah and Abel told 
some reliable Madigas who had gathered with the crowd 
of onlookers, "Go at once and tell our Clough Dhora 
what has happened." The man walked the seventy miles 
in quick time. If I had seen how to take legal action I 
would have done it at once. I sent out two men with in- 
structions, but their courage failed them when they 
reached Markapur. My message, however, reached the 
men inside, "Sing and pray; for such things happened 
even to the Apostle Paul." The first consternation of the 
prisoners was by this time over. They decided on a defi- 
nite course which practically meant triumph to them. 

Jonah was the leader. He was young in the Christian 



154 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

life, and had not learned much of New Testament his- 
tory, but he knew that the apostles were great men in the 
Christian religion. It comforted him and the others to 
know that this tribulation which had so suddenly come 
upon them was no disgrace, but somehow was part of 
Christian experience. Jonah now began to talk con- 
stantly of the sufferings and death of our Lord Jesus. 
He spoke of the nails driven through hands and feet, the 
crown of thorns, the stripes that were laid upon him, all 
borne for the sins of the world. He made light of the 
hardships of that prison and said they deserved them be- 
cause of their own past sinful lives. That he was repeat- 
ing the same statements over and over again, day after 
day, did not trouble him. There was a hymn which he 
now sang. As yet it was the only Christian hymn he 
knew. He sang it all day long. The keepers told him 
to stop — they were weary of it. Jonah said, *T cannot 
stop. This hymn is what I must sing, and I have to sing 
it all the time." The others joined him. The days 
passed. The officials at Markapur learned that I was in 
constant communication with the prisoners, and thought 
best to release them earlier. 

The deed was done. A keynote of the movement had 
been struck. It was the first clash between the Madigas 
and the whole system of oppression which had held them 
for centuries. These men had suffered, but they also had 
been glorified. That whole region marveled greatly. The 
sudden and wrongful imprisonment of sixteen men had 
caused comment. But when the tidings went over the 
country that these men were singing and praying to their 
God inside the prison, and that the keepers could not 
stop them, the people walked long distances to see and 
hear for themselves. Outside the prison there had been 
a constantly changing group of people, chiefly Madigas, 
but also caste people. When not at work on the temple 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 155 

grounds, the prisoners had been continually singing and 
praying. No one had ever heard of anything like it. 
Spiritual power was generated that made itself felt for 
years to come. 

The heat had been unusually severe during that hot 
season. Lakes and rivers were nearly dry. It happened 
several times that the preachers brought converts with 
them to Ongole on the first Sunday of the month, and 
there was no place where we could find sufficient depth 
of water to baptize them. The threats of the people at Co- 
pole to beat us if we came again did not drive me away, 
the scarcity of water did it. I decided to build a baptis- 
tery under a large tamarind tree in our garden. It was a 
beautiful shady place. An idol-shrine had stood there 
since time immemorial. The people of an adjacent ham- 
let had worshiped here, with bloody sacrifice and the 
dance of possession, performing low rites of Sakti wor- 
ship. With a good deal of difficulty I had had the boun- 
dary lines settled. The place where the shrine stood be- 
longed to us. 

When those villagers heard that I intended to demolish 
their shrine they threatened to beat anyone who touched 
it. I made short work of that matter. I took a crowbar, 
ran it into the shrine and threw the stones and mortar 
right and left. The preachers and the men in our school 
were all there and did the rest. If the villagers had fallen 
upon me there would have been an even, square fight with 
my men. They looked on, expecting me to fall dead be- 
fore their eyes, stricken by the demon which they said 
had its abode in that shrine. Nothing happened to me. 
The place was cleared, and we built our baptistery, in 
which since then many thousands have been baptized. 

We now had an experience which was early Chris- 
tianity over again. A large group of men from Marka- 
pur, including those who had been in prison, came to our 



156 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

monthly meeting on August i, 1869. Converts, too, 
came from that direction. They had seen persecution 
and were not afraid. Men from other parts of the field 
were there, the women with them. The sense of Chris- 
tian fellowship was strong within them. What had hap- 
pened concerned everyone, for it dealt with conditions 
which all were facing. In the name of Jesus they were 
going to shake themselves free, not only from idol-wor- 
ship, but from their abject servitude. Religious fervor 
with a touch of martyrdom was fostering a spirit of 
social revolution. It caught them all. I looked on and 
was amazed. They knew they had me on their side. 
My heart went out to them. I was ready to fight for 
them and with them. 

We dedicated our new baptistery that Sunday by im- 
mersing forty-two in it. In the evening we met together 
in the chapel to commemorate the dying love of our 
Saviour. It was nine o'clock. We sang a hymn, but no 
one was willing to go. They wanted me to stay with 
them and tell them what they must do in the coming days. 
If they refused to render service to the Sudras and Brah- 
mans as formerly, persecution would be the consequence. 
Where should they yield and where should they stand 
firmly against their oppressors? I had to put myself in 
their place and learn intimately the conditions in which 
they lived. We all felt the close tie which was binding 
them to each other and to me. They begged for my pres- 
ence out in the direction of Markapur. I promised to 
come soon. Thus we talked far into the night, as the 
Christians in the early centuries talked together of suf- 
fering to come. It gave us a sense of strength and power 
that could come in no other way. 

A month later I went to those distant taluks. The 
people gathered, hundreds at a time, to hear me. Many 
with tears in their eyes told me they believed in Jesus, 







". . . An idol shrine had 
stood there since time immemorial 

. . under a large tamarind 
tree in our garden. . . . The 
place was cleared, and ive built 
our baptistery, in which since then 
many thousands have been bap- 
tirjcd. . . ." 







' w-» v---i «-~ ■•■ :v,Viv>>-r-','.^55^^, f'r.^^^m^^^ 


2£!^Z 


:' iWwmW^-f ' .^ turn ^ J ■Wmm'' 





THE BAPTISTERY AT ONGOLE 

" • . . We dedicated it by immersing forty-two in it, August i, 1869. 
. . _ . They had seen persecution and were not afraid. . . . We talked 
far into the night, as the Christians of the early centuries talked together of 
suffering to come. Religious fervor with a touch of martyrdom was fostering 
a spirit of social revolution. . . . In the name of Jesus they were going to 
shake themselves free." 



I 



COMING BY HUNDREDS 157 

but if their oppressors were already harsh to them, what 
would happen if they openly declared that they had be- 
gun a new life ? I told them to love the Lord Jesus more 
and fear men less, and all would be right. But my heart 
was heavy as I looked on, and found myself powerless 
to help as I wanted to help. I sought an interview with 
the karnam of Markapur. He said he knew nothing of 
that imprisonment, and did not even know that there 
were Christians in that region. I saw through his lies. 
I intimated to him that I would do everything in my 
power to protect the Christians from insult and persecu- 
tion, and reminded him that we were under English gov- 
ernment. Such interviews I often had. Lies were told 
to me; trickery was used on me. I stood it all, for I 
knew how much was at stake for the Christians. The 
Lord Jesus had to help me. The situation required much 
wisdom and patience. 

On this tour I baptized fifty-one. I stayed in many 
villages, and preached in many places. I saw that hun- 
dreds were ready so far as believing in Jesus the Saviour 
was concerned. They needed Christian teaching. I sent 
our workers, men and women, all along the road I had 
gone, to teach the people the leading facts in the life of 
Christ, the Ten Commandments, and something of Chris- 
tian doctrine. All were anxious to learn. A few months 
of this teaching made a great difference. They became 
established in their faith. 

Meanwhile there was a steady increase at Ongole. 
Early in November, 1869, the preachers came to the 
Communion service and brought seventy- four converts 
with them. My diary says, *'A glorious time, indeed." 
This was the largest number we had yet reached at one 
time. Two months later they brought fifty-six. There 
was an ever-increasing movement now spread over five 
taluks. It was strongest at the outposts, seventy miles 



158 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

from Ongole. The force of men whom I had left out 
there urged me to come — they were overpowered by 
numbers. I went. I met with hardships on the way. 
The Gundlacumma River was in flood, yet I managed to 
get across and pressed on. There were places where 
four or five hundred people came to my camp, prepared 
to stay all day, drinking in every word they heard. When 
I stopped talking the preachers took up the story. 

In central places, by the banks of rivers, there were 
baptismal scenes like those of the early centuries of the 
Christian era. These men and women had gone through 
definite Christian experience. I felt no hesitation in re- 
ceiving them into the church, even though they came in 
large numbers. There was that about them which gave 
evidence of their steadfastness in the faith. Three hun- 
dred and twenty-four were added to the church during 
that tour. Hundreds begged to be numbered with us; 
they said they believed in our Lord Jesus, and I knew 
by the look in their faces that they were telling me the 
truth. I left a force of men and women out there to 
teach them, and told them that in due time they would 
be welcomed as members. 

I went back to Ongole and felt that God was with us. 



XI 

A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 

W7TH the tidings about our Lord Jesus three pre- 
cepts were proclaimed to the Madigas of all that region. 
They contained a demand for a rearrangement of every- 
thing that constituted their world. Many listened and 
then put off hearing more ; they were afraid of the conse- 
quences. Others eagerly took hold. They grasped the 
fact that this was the way for them to rise out of their 
abject position. It found them ready. 

Those three precepts were : Do not work on Sunday ; 
do not eat carrion ; do not worship idols. They all went 
straight against the cooperative system of the Indian 
village. 

In social ideals nothing could have been farther apart 
than I, with my American respect for individual rights, 
and these Madigas, bound up in a system where the com- 
munity was everything and the individual counted as 
nothing. I adapted myself to the people, and my Ameri- 
can ways of thinking became to a considerable extent 
merged into their oriental way of dealing with each other. 
I let Christianity find a place for itself in the common 
village life, and expand along the lines of the old-time 
manner of thought and life. But my conciliatory attitude 
came to an abrupt stop where the question of individual 
rights came in. There I was ready to fight for the Madi- 
gas — and fight I did. 

159 



l6o SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

I did not realize when I began work in Ongole that 
some of the simple Christian precepts which I was giving 
out to the Madiga inquirers were of a kind to strike a 
blow at the ancient system of the Dravidian village com- 
munity. The bulk of Christian teaching caused no ripple 
of dissent. Where so many kinds of worship dwell side 
by side, as in India, a new form would not have called 
forth special religious intolerance. If the Madigas had 
simply accepted Jesus Christ as their Master, and had 
prayed to him and found their souls' salvation in him, 
no one would have opposed them or persecuted them. 
Most of the ethical teaching of Christianity, too, was ac- 
cepted without question. If I told them they must not 
steal, they must give up their practice of marrying their 
children in infancy, they must speak the truth — they as- 
sented. Indian reformers, like the Yogi Nasriah, had 
thus taught. They could rearrange their lives in ac- 
cordance with this teaching and no one would be dis- 
turbed or set at variance. It was different with those 
three precepts : they were like a battle-cry. 

India, at that time, was in a state of transition. The 
coming of the white man was recent, but the result was 
already apparent. The old hard lines of the communal 
life were being effaced. Men disengaged themselves little 
by little. The Pariahs, standing outside the lines of the 
caste system, were accessible to a disintegrating force. 
They had nothing to lose and much to gain. To them the 
Christian appeal contained the seeds to a social uprising. 
If they obeyed those three precepts a labor war on a 
small scale was in sight. 

Periah and the men who soon grouped themselves with 
him as leaders of their people were not in favor of com- 
promise. They knew what those three precepts meant 
to the Madigas. I was in my formative period and was 
always ready to listen when they told me their side of 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION l6l 

any question that arose. If they had advised me to leave 
those three rules in the background and not bring pres- 
sure to bear upon the converts to heed them, I would 
probably have yielded so far as I could. It would have 
made the situation far easier for them and for me. But 
that was the course which they did not take. Those three 
rules were heralded over the country. Many of the old 
men afterwards said they heard of these first, and the 
tidings about Jesus Christ came to them afterward. Men 
inquired of each other whether they intended to live by 
those three precepts. They were gaining strength by 
numbers. 

The first of the three rules. Do not work on Sunday, 
affected their relations to their employers, especially their 
Sudra masters. It was considered fortunate for Madiga 
families when they could serve the same Sudra families 
for generations. Often the attitude of the masters to- 
ward their serfs was protective and kind. But under the 
prevailing system the reverse was possible. Especially 
when the Madiga went into debt, the Sudra could prac- 
tically own him; he could oppress him so that he could 
hardly call his life his own. 

When now the Madigas asked for one day in seven, on 
which they could rest and meet together to serve their 
God, it called for a readjustment of their relations to 
their Sudra employers. The Hindus had days set aside 
for religious observances. Many of these were feast 
days, in which the Madigas, in a humble way, were al- 
lowed to share. Indian forms of worship came into 
prominence during those feast days. The Christian Mad- 
igas were bound to withdraw from them. This might 
have been permitted without opposition. But they now 
made a demand for one day in seven. There was friction 
in consequence. The Sudras found themselves com- 
pelled to arrange their field work in a way to meet this 



l62 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

demand of their old-time serfs. Perhaps they were some- 
times irritated unnecessarily by the Christians when they 
insisted they must obey this law of their God. I might 
have been more conciliatory in my attitude toward the 
question if my father's Puritan ideas of keeping the Sab- 
bath holy had not become so deeply rooted in my re- 
ligious conscience. I tried to enforce a strict observance 
of the Sabbath, and it caused trouble everywhere. 

The Christians often appealed to me. Sometimes re- 
adjustment came as a matter of course; sometimes fric- 
tion ended in peaceful settlement; sometimes the people 
felt that the Lord Jesus himself must have helped them. 

The Madiga families in the Podili taluk, which were 
among the first to come to us, formed an entering wedge 
that helped all the rest. The case was typical ; for these 
Madiga families stood above the average, and the Sudra 
families to whom they had been attached for generations 
included the munsiif, the head man of the whole village 
according to ancient Dravidian order. The Madigas told 
them in a respectful way that they had become Chris- 
tians, and that this meant a change to them in various 
ways. They asked to be excused from work on Adiva- 
ramu — the first day of the week. This refusal to come 
to work at all times as heretofore vexed the Sudras. 
They decided to teach the Christians their place in the 
community, and let them learn the result of the stand they 
had taken. It was then harvest time. During all the 
previous months the Madigas had helped plow and till 
the soil. It was now their right, according to ancient 
custom, to help in the harvest, and receive their share of 
grain. The Sudras, to enforce the lesson, thrashed their 
grain on Sundays, and the Christians thus lost their 
portion. This was done on several consecutive Sundays. 
The Christians felt it keenly : it was an injustice, and it 
meant, to them, a heavy loss. 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 163 

Then there came a Sunday when the Sudras were 
again out on the fields thrashing their grain. The aged 
mother of the munsiff had stayed at home. She made a 
fire to boil a little milk. While she was away for a few 
minutes the fire touched a basket of bran standing near, 
which soon burned lustily. Before the men could be 
called from the field ten of their houses were destroyed 
by fire. All the grain that had been gathered on those 
Sundays to spite the Christians was burned. The old 
mother ran away to hide herself for half a day, and 
when she again appeared, half distracted, she wailed, 
''God sent it as a punishment." She had been harsh in 
her attitude to the Christians, and had been in favor of 
depriving them of their rightful portion of the harvest. 
That she should have been the cause of so much loss 
seemed to all a judgment from God. It ended the strife 
in that taluk. Everywhere the Sudras thought it best 
to run no risks. They attended to small tasks on Sun- 
day, and did their important work during the six days 
when the Christians could join them. This incident was 
soon reported in all the taluks where the movement 
spread, and it had an undoubted effect. The Christians 
thought that our Master Jesus had helped them in their 
difficult position. I told them they were right about this. 

The second rule. Do not eat carrion, also had a direct 
effect upon the relation of the Madigas to their employers. 
It concerned the leather work which they had to do for 
the whole village. There were sandals to sew, trappings 
to make for the bullocks, and large leather buckets to 
make and keep in repair for bringing the water up from 
deep wells to irrigate the fields. The arrangement was on 
a cooperative basis. The people who represented various 
trades in the village served one another with the labor 
of their hands, giving of their produce in exchange. 
None had so small a margin of profit allotted to them as 



164 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

the Madigas. Nor was theirs a clean poverty; the con- 
ditions of their occupation had lent themselves to de- 
grading practices that made them abhorrent tO' other men. 

The Hindus never allowed the slaughter of cattle for 
purposes of food. When cattle died of disease, or old 
age, or starvation, the Madigas were called. They took 
the animal to their hamlet. In return for the hide they 
agreed to furnish leather articles, according to its size. 
The carcass was theirs as part of the bargain. In that 
hot climate this meant pollution. The Madiga hamlet 
was full of filth. Going hungry many a day in the year 
produced a willingness to eat what no one else would 
have touched. The consequence was that the men and 
women had poisoned blood in their veins. The children 
were full of sores. The Madiga hamlet was a place 
which no one wanted to enter. It was always separate 
and a little to one side of the rest of the village. Any- 
one who wanted anything from the Madigas, whether the 
collector of taxes or the man who called them to work — 
stood a long way off and transacted his business quickly. 

This was the curse of their lives. They knew it. Their 
tribal legends were full of this idea. In some of them 
an Aryan sage, long ago, pronounced a curse over them ; 
in others the tribal ancestor was responsible for their 
degradation. There were stories of a terrible famine 
which came upon the land at a remote time, when the 
Madigas held a respected place in the community. In the 
pangs of starvation they gathered about a bullock that 
had died, and ate in order to live, and never after were 
they able to raise their heads. 

With the help of Christianity they now fought that 
curse and rose above it. I helped them. For my own 
sake I wanted to see them make a break with their past. 
This cause of their degradation was intolerable to me. 
Sometimes I felt I must do something to preserve my 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 1 65 

own status. White men at that time were few in that 
part of India. The caste people could not understand my 
motives; they did not see why I should identify myself 
with the lowest portion of their social life. Groups of 
Sudras used to come to my tent when I was out on tour — 
fine looking people. I spread mats for them and asked 
them to stay. I wanted them to feel that I was as one of 
them. I said that in my own country my father was a 
wealthy landowner like themselves, that he had a farm 
of a thousand acres, more fertile than any they had ever 
seen, that he had ten horses in the stable and cattle in the 
pasture, and that I as his son had been given a portion 
of all this. They wondered about it. It did them good. 
It helped the Madigas. The fact was repeated wherever 
the movement spread that "the Ongole Dhora" was not a 
man without caste in his own country. Lack of food and 
clothes did not bring him to India. Moreover, he was a 
man who acted as if he could earn anywhere enough for 
himself and his wife and children. Then why had he 
come to India, bringing this religion to the Madigas ? 

That rule against eating carrion was probably never 
before framed and brought into force in all the propa- 
ganda of Christianity. We made it a stringent rule in 
the beginning. During all the first ten or twenty years 
candidates for baptism were asked whether they agreed 
to abstain from this practice. Afterward the younger 
generation would have felt insulted had we asked them. 
In the old days it meant a good deal. A lapse in this re- 
spect indicated that there was a reversion to the old man- 
ner of life. When the preachers reported that a village 
of Christians was reverting to heathenism they always 
added: **They are eating carrion again." It was not 
because they loved their degradation. They had been 
without work and had gone hungry. Everything was 
dragging them down. 



l66 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

I sometimes stood before the men and women of a 
village where they were weak Christians, and felt a sense 
of personal shame. They admitted their fault; they still 
wanted to serve the Lord Jesus; they lacked the will to 
rise to a purposeful life. My last appeal to them some- 
times was on my own behalf. I said to them: *'Oh, 
men ! I am not ashamed to be the Guru of poor people, 
for Christ said he had come that the sick might be healed 
and the poor have the gospel preached to them. But when 
I see weak Christians before me then I have a pain in my 
mind, and I wonder why God has chosen me to be the 
Guru of such dirty people." This appeal often went 
home to their hearts. A look of shame passed over their 
faces. The women involuntarily stroked down their un- 
kempt hair ; the men looked at each other. 

There was unrest everywhere. The Sudras had to 
learn to make with the Madigas bargains that concerned 
only the hide. The traders in hides had to settle on new 
rates when the carcass could not be thrown in as part of 
the sale. But the sharpest clash was in the family 
circle. When one sat apart at meal-time because carrion 
was boiling in the pot, it was a change that affected the 
solidarity of the family. The women especially resented 
this. "Do you see him? He will not eat. He, too, is 
going to that Ongole religion!" Where the Christians 
were in the majority in a family, they sat on one side and 
ate clean food. They refused to allow the others to 
touch their cooking utensils or earthen plates. They 
said, **We turn sick when you touch our food. You are 
unclean." Instead of being ostracized, they were the ones 
who ostracized the others. Thus they fought the curse. 
Public opinion was formed. The women took it up. 
Everybody began to feel forced into line. Clean family 
life and clean hamlets were the result. 

It would seem that the third precept, Do not worship 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 1 67 

idols, was wholly directed to the religious conscience of 
the individual, and had nothing to do with the communal 
life. This was not the case. For some cause, which lies 
in a remote past, the Madigas performed important func- 
tions whenever a festival was arranged for idol-worship. 
It was the duty of the Madiga headmen to furnish men 
from their hamlet for this, as many as were required. In 
return they received payment in kind, in accordance with 
the cooperative system of the village. The beating of the 
drums was the business of the Madigas; no one else 
could touch them. There was a reason for the impor- 
tance given to the drums. It was thought that invisible 
spirits, which hover close to the earth, would perceive 
the peculiar vibrating din of the drums and could thereby 
bring themselves in touch with the worshipers. They 
would be appeased, and would refrain from sending evil 
upon the community. 

Then there was the dance of possession — the sivam — 
which only the Madigas could perform. When, during 
the festival, the time came to take the idol in procession 
through the main street of the village it was a leading 
feature to have Madigas dance before it. In the various 
forms of nature-worship, as practiced in the Indian vil- 
lage, the sivam had a place. The men elected for it were 
given drugs that partly stupefied, but gave abnormal en- 
durance in keeping up a swaying motion by the hour. 
Sometimes they uttered words and groans, and showed 
symptoms of possession, and then it was thought the 
invisible being represented by the idol was finding expres- 
sion through them. This was considered satisfactory. 

The intention back of it all was that the Madigas 
should identify themselves with the fiends and demons 
of the land, and keep them in check. Then there would 
be no smallpox, no cholera, no cattle disease, and no 
famine. This had been considered their task for manv 



1 68 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

centuries. When the Dravidian invaders came upon 
them, in the remote past, they probably found them per- 
forming these rites. They allowed them to continue, 
for they themselves were demon-worshipers. Nor was 
there any change when the Indo-Aryans came into the 
land. They had their high conceptions of religion and 
their sacred books. But as they wanted to be the teachers 
and priests of the Dravidians, they found it necessary to 
adapt themselves more or less to their religious ideas. 
The result was a mixture between Aryan and non- Aryan 
cults. The lowest of all the cults were those which the 
Madigas performed with the shedding of blood and hide- 
ous rites. The Brahmans and the Sudras had combined 
in holding the Madigas to their task. As the belief in 
demons was general, no one was willing to release the 
Madigas from their intermediatory position. 

It now happened in the spread of Christianity that 
whole villages of Christians refused in a body to perform 
their old-time duties at some festival. They said : "We 
cannot beat those drums. We cannot have anything to 
do with idol-worship. We are Christians." There was 
often risk that this announcement would call forth vio- 
lence. It took courage to make it. The refusal was not 
viewed as a religious change : it was considered a labor 
strike; a species of rebellion against the village com- 
munity. The clash was not only with the Sudras ; it was 
also with the Brahmans. The element of harshness came 
in. The Madigas were in the grip of their oppressors, 
and there was often more suffering than I could face on 
behalf of the people without taking every step possible 
to defend them. 

Fortunately we were under British rule. The procla- 
mation of religious liberty had been issued to all British 
subjects in India when the government was transferred 
to the Crown in 1858. This was good; we could ask for 



! 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 1 69 

nothing more. But how to get the application made to 
the Pariah class — that was another question. Intolerant 
native officials of every grade had to wheel into line and 
adapt themselves to the white man's views of liberty and 
toleration. It took them many years. We missionaries 
there did a service. Close to the people, we taught many 
a village official that he must obey not only the letter of 
the law given by the Christian rulers of the land; the 
spirit of it must be obeyed. A great change has come in 
the course of the years. Enlightened Hindus are lending 
a hand to uplift this submerged tenth of their population. 
There was nothing of this kind in the days when I began 
work. 

The Lord Jesus must have given me my task, for to 
him the common people came gladly. It was a situation 
like that of New Testament times. The religious hier- 
archy of that region had refused me. I found my place 
in the English system of authority and order, but I went 
a step farther. A typical American of the most demo- 
cratic type, I had as a constituency a democratic religious 
body to support me. Dr. Warren was strong in holding 
me to the democratic principles of our denomination. 
No wonder that the outlaws — the Pariahs — came. They 
were the only group of people who were available for an 
experiment in reducing democratic religious principles 
to practice. When now they tried to effect their release 
from the social system, which was hardened by the sta- 
bility of many centuries, there was opposition. The Lord 
Jesus helped us through it all. We stood our ground, 
and were not defeated. 

In all the oppression under which our Christians suf- 
fered there were seldom definite acts that were a direct 
violation of law. Where there were such acts I engaged 
legal advice and helped the Christians fight out the case. 
I always ran the risk of failure. False witnesses against 



170 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

them could be bought with a few coins. The native offi- 
cials who generally tried such a case were full of re- 
sources to shield those of their own caste. Nevertheless, 
the caste people knew that I was always on the alert, 
ready to bring the force of the law upon them if I could. 
That in itself acted as a deterrent. 

One case of persecution in the Kanigiri taluk was 
taken into court by the Christians. It had had the usual 
preliminaries: cattle disease was prevalent, the wells 
were running dry, there was fear of cholera. The caste 
people thought this must all be due to the fact that the 
Madigas had refused to do their share in appeasing in- 
visible forces. There was a temple in the taluk to An- 
kalama, like Ellama, one of the ten great Saktis in India, 
all a form of Parvati, the consort of Siva — the Destroyer. 
Parvati is thought to go forth at times for carnage. The 
terrible in nature is ascribed to Siva and to her. She 
delights in destroying as well as in recreating. All fear 
the power of the Sakti, no matter what the caste, or what 
otherwise the mode of worship may be. The priests of 
this temple of Ankalama, backed by the demand of the 
people, made preparations for a feast of unusual pomp. 
A leading feature of it was to be the return into their old- 
time service of the Madigas who had become Christians. 
They were to beat the drums. 

Crowds of worshipers began to gather. The festival 
was in course of preparation. The village karnam sent 
a messenger to bring the Christians. They replied that 
their religion forbade them to have anything to do with 
idol-worship. Five village constables were then sent to 
fetch five of the leading Christians. They were brought 
by force. Water was poured over their heads until it 
was thought the antagonism of their Christian religion 
had been washed away. Their heads were shaved — a top- 
knot was left. Their foreheads were marked with the 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION I7I 

sign of Siva-worship. The drums were forced into their 
hands. For three days they had to endure the shame of 
their position. Crowds of people passed who knew that 
they were Christians. 

The five men had gathered up the hair as it fell under 
the razor, and tied it into their cloth. They hastened to 
Ongole and told me their story, showing the hair in their 
cloth, taking off their turbans to show the mutilation. I 
saw that there was a point here that lent itself to legal 
procedure. I helped the men file a case in court. The 
English magistrate of Ongole tried it. He asked the five 
Christians whether they considered themselves to have 
been insulted. They said, *Tt was as if our throats had 
been cut, our shame was so great." It was a clear case 
of insult to the religious conviction of British subjects. 
The maximum punishment was five years. The karnam 
was a Brahman. He had to pay a fine of thirty rupees 
and was imprisoned for three months. This meant pol- 
lution of the worst kind for him and would formerly 
have been thought impossible. The case helped the 
cause of the Madigas greatly. It proved beyond a doubt 
that the outcastes had the same rights before British law 
as the Brahmans. 

There were many ways of evading the law. There was 
scope for petty persecutions which nothing could stop. 
All through the years, here and there over the field, trou- 
ble arose. The cause was always that the Madigas were 
rising out of their abject position. When they had a 
school in their hamlet and began to be self-respecting and 
self-reliant, the caste people thought it time to teach their 
former serfs their place in the community. The co- 
operative system of the village was turned against them. 
The village washermen were told not to wash for them ; 
the potter was told not to sell pots to them; their cattle 
were driven from the common grazing ground; the Su- 



172 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

dras combined in a refusal to give them the usual work 
of sewing sandals and harness ; at harvest time they were 
not allowed to help and lost their portion of grain. They 
were boycotted on every hand. The karnam called Madi- 
gas from elsewhere to do the scavenger work of the vil- 
lage, and the Christians had no alternative but to go to 
distant villages to find a little work and earn a scant 
pittance. They often came close to the margin of starva- 
tion. 

This program was followed in many a village. The 
people appealed to their preachers; the preachers ap- 
pealed to me. Those oppressors always knew that they 
might in some way have to reckon with me. It is prob- 
ably true, as a group of the old Ongole preachers said 
when they were talking of those days : "If the fear of 
our Clough Dhora had not been in the minds of all the 
munsiffs and karnams of that region we could not have 
stood." Preacher Kola Peddiah had an experience of 
this kind. He was a man who more than once suffered 
tribulation with his flock. Even in his old age he hastened 
to a temple festival to reason with those who were forc- 
ing the drums into the hands of his people. They fell 
upon him and beat him, and the old man's coat, stained 
with his blood, was produced in court as evidence. His 
eyes radiant with gratitude, Peddiah used to tell how in 
the early days, before a crowd of oppressors I had called 
him my tamurdu — my younger brother. 

There had been much suffering, for a village of Chris- 
tians in the Kanigiri taluk had been brought to the limit 
of endurance. I went there on tour. It was known that 
my tent had come and that I would arrive in the morn- 
ing. Crowds of people had gathered from all the neigh- 
boring villages to see what I would do about this perse- 
cution. If I failed to bring about a change there were 
other karnams everywhere who would try similar meas- 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 1/3 

ures with the Christians. I went through the main street 
of the village. On one side among the crowd, his arms 
deferentially folded over his chest, stood the karnam, a 
Brahman. Peddiah, with the Christians, walking close 
by, pointed him out to me: "That is the man." The 
karnam made many and deep salaams. I did not notice 
him. Already anxious, he now became full of fear. He 
had boycotted the Christians ; I now boycotted him. He 
began to make excuses; I did not look his way. Insist- 
ing on being heard, he said, *T did not do that work. 
There are no witnesses." 

Then I turned my horse on to him, and he had to get 
out of the road for my horse, as the Christians had many 
a time run away before him. I said : "You say there are 
no witnesses. The Christians have told me what you 
did. The preacher, who is like my tamurdu, has told 
me. Would my younger brother lie to me? You are 
the liar, not the preacher." I called him some hard 
names. I was weighed down by the persecutions the 
Christians were suffering, and this man got the force of 
my pent-up indignation. He began to make promises 
that he would be kind to the Christians. I made him 
repeat those promises before all that crowd as he stood 
there with his arms still folded over his chest. I declared 
that I was "afraid of his lying words." I told him and 
all who pressed close in order to hear every word : "Be- 
ware how you persecute these Christians. Their God is 
not like your idols who hear not and see not. When 
these poor men pray, God is not far off." 

It ended that persecution. All that was said and done 
during those few minutes of public encounter was re- 
peated hundreds of times over the field. It was a clear 
case of intimidation on my part. But it did the work. 
My horse helped. It was a fine white animal, full of 
spirit — few dared to mount it. The preachers were proud 



174 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

of it. I realized this when, the mission in debt, I had to 
cut down their small income and, to help them, offered to 
sell the horse and divide the money among them. They 
said: "Never mind about us. Keep the horse. What 
should we say to all who stand ready to persecute us if 
they ask us whether our Dhora no longer rides a horse ?" 
They were right. We needed everything that could help 
us hold our place. 

Sometimes I faced village officials and found that 
nothing could make them change their course. I could 
generally count on a degree of kind-heartedness with the 
munsiff, always a Sudra, remnant of the old paternal 
Dravidian village rule. The karnam was the one whom 
the people feared most. He was always a Brahman, 
kept accounts and collected taxes. Proud of his race, his 
attitude toward the people was often very harsh. The 
old preachers say I once thrashed a karnam in the Kani- 
giri taluk because he treated with insolence my request 
for leniency toward the Christians. I had no right to do 
this, and he might have had me in court. But he dared 
not ; for I, in turn, might have been able to prove a case 
against him for violating the law of religious toleration. 
I might have shown him unfit for his office. He kept 
still, and that thrashing worked good for the Christians. 

Standing between the people and their oppressors, I 
incurred every kind of personal risk. There was a night 
out in camp when I nearly died of poison. I had had a 
somewhat stormy interview with the munsiif of the place, 
during which I had insisted that he must stop his perse- 
cutions. Later I drank a cup of tea ; the milk had arsenic 
in it. It was an overdose and that saved me. After that 
my servants grew vigilant. Our faithful cook, Cartiah, 
watched over me, especially on tour, and would not let 
me eat or drink anything unless he knew exactly where 
it had been obtained. He saved my life many a time by 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 175 

his carefulness. Fruit was brought to me poisoned. Once 
I stood on my veranda, interviewing people who had 
come from far and near. A munsiff with four Sudras 
approached me with smiling faces, offering me a gift of 
fruit on a brass tray. I had just helped the Christians 
in their village win a case against them, and they were 
to pay sixty rupees fine. If I should suddenly die they 
could keep their money. I saw by the looks of all who 
stood there that they had misgivings about the fruit. I 
said, "This is bitter stuff. You persecuted our Chris- 
tians. I do not want your gifts." I took the fruit, large 
and small, piece by piece, from the tray, and hurled 
it among the trees in front of the veranda, so that the bits 
flew in every direction. 

Once I was mauled with bamboo sticks. I had bought 
ground adjoining our compound on which to build houses 
for our helpers. To have Christians living so close to them 
angered the people of the neighborhood. I went to direct 
some coolies in clearing the ground and those people fell 
upon me with long bamboos. My umbrella was smashed 
out of my hands — my pith hat protected my head a little. 
The cook was the first to hear the noise. He came run- 
ning and dragged away the strongest of those men. Then 
my future staff of preachers, all still in school, heard 
some one calling, 'They are beating our Dhora !" Like a 
whirlwind they came. They fell upon the chief offender, 
and were so close to murdering him that I forgot my 
bruises and pulled my men away. Preacher Abraham, 
when he was an old man, in telling about it said, "We 
dragged that man along the ground by his juttu, and his 
hair stayed in our hands.'* With exulting eyes he looked 
into his hands, as if he still had the hair in them. The 
police inspector insisted I must take the case to court. A 
native official tried it. Fines and imprisonment were 
light. But a series of reverses now fell upon that fam- 



176 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

ily ; they lost cattle and crops ; the men of the family died. 
Rumor greatly exaggerated it, but a superstitious fear 
fell upon the people in and beyond Ongole. They said : 
"It is not well to touch that Dhora. He has a powerful 
God, who smites those who injure him.'* The sequel 
was, that during the famine, when standing on my 
veranda giving help to the crowds who came, I saw one 
of those men waiting with the rest. I said, "Are you not 
the man who beat me ?" He said he was. Without an- 
other word I put rupees into his hands, and again when- 
ever he came. The piece of land on account of which I 
suffered I later made over to our society. In doing so 
I did not speak of the mauling. I threw that in for 
nothing. 

As I look back upon the attempts made to take my life 
I wonder that I escaped. I was well-nigh fearless. If 
the preachers had ever seen me in hiding, or afraid, their 
own courage would have suffered a shock. They watched 
over me and practically formed a body-guard around me. 
I sometimes told them that a man of God in my own 
country had spoken a word to me, that I would be "in- 
vulnerable until my work was done," and that I believed 
it to be a true word. 

Our social revolution was not all a contest. I had 
friends among the village officials over all that region. 
Those who were kind to the Christians could count on me 
as their friend. When they came to Ongole on business 
they always called on me. I talked with them and showed 
an interest in their welfare. Sometimes it came my way 
to do them a good turn — to speak a word on their behalf 
to some higher official. Out on tour they came to my 
tent. I treated them with much courtesy, asking them to 
sit down on my camp chairs and to be present when I 
preached to the gathering crowds. During my sermon I 
occasionally deferred to them and asked them whether I 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 177 

was not telling the people the truth. It was a part of my 
missionary work which I enjoyed. There was a touch of 
political activity in it. The English officials reckoned 
with this. It came to my ears that they said when one 
of them was transferred elsewhere and there was vacancy 
for a time : "No matter, Clough is up there. Let him see 
to law and order." My hopes for a career as lawyer and 
politician were given up when I became a missionary, 
yet for the sake of the people that career was neverthe- 
less sustained, brought into service for the sake of my 
Master, Jesus Christ. 

There was one direction where I was almost power- 
less in the social upheaval of those early days. When it 
touched the family circle I could do nothing. Often men 
and women who believed in Jesus found all the ties that 
bound them to their kindred straining and breaking. The 
Madigas never employed the methods of the caste people ; 
they never let a man quietly disappear off the face of the 
earth because he no longer belonged to them. But the 
course which they did take was often very hard to bear. 
A family could quietly see one of its members change 
from one Indian cult to another, and sit at the feet of one 
Guru after another. It made no difference because the 
relations of the family to the rest of the village remained 
unchanged. Not so when anyone became a Christian. 

Often it was the strongest man in the family who first 
made the decision that he must believe in Jesus. Then 
the rest fell into fear: the people of their hamlet would 
hate them; the Sudras would refuse them work; the vil- 
lage gods would begin to afBict, and then the Brahmans 
would let them feel their power. The women had much 
to say in tnis. They asked the question that concerned 
them all: "Where will we find enough to eat?" Men 
came to me, sore at heart, tried to the utmost. They 
asked for baptism. Since they were cast out by their 



178 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

families they wanted at least to belong to us. Generally 
I advised them to wait, to endure with steadfastness, as 
that would most surely win their families. 

There was Munangi Anumiah, afterwards the leading 
preacher in the Cumbum taluk. He heard a rumor that 
the Ongole Dhora had a powerful God, and that he was 
urging many Madigas to believe in him, so that some day, 
when he had them all kneeling in a line, he could take a 
wire like those which the English had fastened to the 
telegraph poles, and cut their necks with it, as a sacrifice 
to his God. Anumiah believed this rumor and was afraid. 
Then one day Nimmiah, one of the earliest converts, came 
that way and told him the Ten Commandments. He said, 
"Would they teach us words like these, which parents 
teach their children, if they intended to cut off our 
necks?" Anumiah agreed that there was no reason for 
fear, and befriended Nimmiah when the rest were mak- 
ing fun of him. He heard of those three precepts, and 
they sank into his mind. There came a day when he did 
not want to eat carrion any more. Then the fight began. 
The women resented his aloofness ; they turned his wife 
against him. But he managed to get enough to eat some- 
how and kept his peace. 

That precept about the Sabbath troubled him. When 
the Sudra master called to work on Sunday he went, and 
while working "prayed quietly in his mind." One Sun- 
day the whole family was ordered to come for a special 
job. Anumiah felt he had done this long enough and re- 
fused to obey. This was the signal. The whole family 
risked the displeasure of their Sudra master and stayed 
at home to fight it out. There was a big family quarrel, 
and it continued for months. Bezwada Paul came that 
way, but he dared not go near. The father and two 
brothers were there and all the women. Then Periah and 
Nagama came. They had the right of way everywhere. 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 179 

Periah was distantly related to the family, but aside from 
this no one dared treat him with anything but respect. 
The house was swept, and he was made welcome. When 
he left he said to Anumiah, "Continue to pray; your fam- 
ily will come." After a time he broke away and went 
to live with the Christians. Then the family tie asserted 
itself. They begged him to come back. The men of his 
household had their juttus cut off. Several were bap- 
tized. Anumiah came to our school. His mother found 
it hard to give him up. She walked to Ongole with him. 
She stood and looked in, as he began to learn his alpha- 
bet, and then she turned to walk back home, a weary 
seventy miles, without him. He said of this when an 
old man, "My mother cried when she left me, not be- 
cause she was sorrowful, but because she loved me so 
much." 

The women, too, suffered and stood firm. There was 
one, Nagama, on Periah's field, who had a full measure 
of tribulation. Her husband raised no objections when 
she became a Christian. Then her eldest son, a lad of 
sixteen, died. It was said the village gods had done this, 
and her husband began to illtreat her and to insist that 
she must give up the new religion. Then another child 
died. He tied her to a tree and beat her ; he dragged her 
about by the hair till she had little left. Through it all, 
her faith in God and his mercy did not fail her. The hus- 
band left her and went away with another woman. Pe- 
riah brought her to Ongole, leading a bright little boy by 
the hand, her only remaining child. He said, "This 
woman has been an honor to me and to my Master, 
Jesus Christ, over all my field. Train her as a Bible 
woman." She became one of the best in the mission. 

The more united the family, the harder the struggle. 
When in addition the family had standing, and a good 
income through some form of priesthood, the blow 



l80 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

fell hard. The question of caste did not come into 
consideration with the Madigas, or Malas; for they had 
none to lose. Nevertheless, the future of the whole fam- 
ily was made uncertain, and the members rebelled. The 
hardest case of the kind on the Ongole field was that of 
the Gumbadi family. There were four brothers, all Mala 
priests, belonging to the Ramanuja sect. Oogriah, the 
best of the four, made the break. He could read, and 
wherever he came upon the tracts which Obulu sold in 
that region he told the people they were bad books, and 
with their j>ermission tore them up publicly in the bazaar. 
But he read them first. He was wide awake in every 
direction, ready to learn what came his way. He had 
for a time practiced Raja Yoga, and then had joined 
in a secret cult of nature worship. None of these changes 
had affected him as a priest of Vishnu. Not so with 
Christianity; it had a social aspect. He met Obulu one 
day, and asked him many questions. Obulu was not the 
man to argue with Oogriah, who had passed from one 
Indian cult to another. In his simple-minded way he 
told Oogriah about Jesus Christ as a living reality. It 
carried conviction. Upheaval now came into Oogriah's 
life. 

One morning, after spending the night in acting, with 
his three brothers, a drama having the main episodes in 
the life of Krishna for its subject, he found that the crisis 
had come. It was impossible for him to continue. He 
sat down under a tree and read a Christian tract. The 
brothers called him to come and eat of the food which 
had first been offered to the idols. His reply sent con- 
sternation to their hearts, "I have even now believed in 
Jesus Christ, and will no longer have anything to do with 
idols, and will not eat anything that has been offered to 
idols." There was a hot dispute on the spot. Finally 
the brothers asked, "Then how do you expect to make 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION l8l 

your living?" Oogriah replied wearily: "Do not ask me 
that. God will show me. If he does not see fit to feed 
me, ni die." 

This was the beginning of eighteen months of hard 
contest in that family. Oogriah had been their pride. 
Through him they were well-to-do. Now he was as noth- 
ing among them. His wife turned against him, and her 
family took her away. The mother alone was on 
Oogriah's side. She reproved his brothers when they 
went too far in showing disrespect to him. They tried 
to go about with their idols as before, but they missed 
Oogriah. Contracts had been made here and there to 
perform the drama of Krishna; much gain was in sight. 
As Oogriah always played the chief part they had to 
cancel the contracts and return the money advanced to 
them. Wherever they went they were asked what mad- 
ness possessed Oogriah. 

I passed that way on tour. It gave prestige to 
Oogriah. Everybody came to my camp ; his brothers, too, 
came. I talked with them, but they held back. I was the 
first white man they had seen near by. As they stood 
and watched me they decided that "this Dhora could have 
earned food and clothes if he had stayed in his own coun- 
try, and his religion therefore could not be worthless." 
Oogriah followed me from camp to camp, and when 
finally he returned home his brothers asked him, "Why 
do you come back ? Did not your Guru take you straight 
to heaven?" As the months passed Oogriah withdrew 
from home. His strength was giving way. He stayed 
with Christians in a neighboring village and did coolie 
work to support himself. He and his Christian friends 
felt the strain intolerable. They set ten days' time dur- 
ing which they would pray for those three brothers. 

Something now happened. The brothers were con- 
ducting a household ceremony with their idols. There 



1 82 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

was feasting and drinking, and then all slept. Mean- 
while, a dog came and carried off in its teeth the best of 
the idols, made of copper and silver, and left it on a heap 
of rubbish. At dawn it was found there with the marks 
of the dog's teeth upon it. This occurrence shook the 
eldest brother. When next he tried to conduct worship 
with the idols his hands trembled. He gave up then. 
There came a night when he could not sleep because a 
hard fight was going on within him. In the morning he 
walked toward the village where his brother Oogriah was 
staying. Eight of the ten days had passed. Oogriah had 
just had a dream that his eldest brother was praying with 
him. He was coming toward home. They met. They 
fell upon each other's neck and wept. There was rejoic- 
ing in the family. They came together in a group to 
Ongole. The four brothers became preachers. Oogriah 
was a valuable man, and when he suddenly died of 
cholera his place was never filled. 

The mothers generally ranged themselves on the side 
of the heretic. The strong tie of motherhood could bear 
any strain. But sometimes even that failed. In one in- 
stance, on our field, a mother cursed her son ; never, even 
when he was an elderly man, could he speak of it without 
tears running down his cheeks. He was Namburi Pedda 
Lakshmanursu, a Mala priest. The first of the Chris- 
tian preachers who came to his village found him fiercely 
opposed. But when Oogriah came and talked with him, 
he admitted that there was food for the soul in this new 
religion. His attitude soon turned the village against 
him. His mother and two younger brothers withdrew 
from him. They treated his wife harshly, telling her 
that if she had courage to leave him he would soon come 
back to the old ways. He brought her relief by saying 
to her before them, *'You cannot keep me from becoming 



A SOCIAL REVOLUTION 1 83 

a Christian, even though you leave me." She gently 
replied, **Why should I go where you are not?" 

He endured this for a time. Then he came to Ongole, 
asked for baptism and consented to have his top-knot of 
hair cut off. As he returned home he found his wife by 
the roadside waiting for him, her child in her arms. He 
saw that she was crying and knew what he had to face. 
With a firm step he went to the house. He laid his tur- 
ban aside, preparatory to performing his duties as a 
householder. When his mother saw his head, saw that 
the juttu was gone, she said, in a voice choked with 
fierce emotion : "I brought you forth and cared for you 
in the hope that in my old age I should be cared for by 
you. But now I shall not eat food that comes from your 
hands. Go away! You are to me as those who are 
dead!" 

The two younger brothers became Christians, the father 
died with a quiet faith and trust in Jesus Christ. The 
mother was outwardly unyielding, yet she was growing 
old and was glad when she could have at least one of her 
sons at home with her. It happened at a time when the 
three sons were away from home for a few days that she 
died, after a short illness. When the tidings reached 
them, the three men looked at each other. Each knew 
the thought of the other. The eldest son hid his face in 
his hands and wept : "She said that I was as one dead to 
her, and no food would she accept at my hands in her old 
age. She has died with her sons far distant, alone, as 
she said she would be." 

It all was hard to bear. Yet none of us felt like mak- 
ing a compromise. I might have told the preachers not 
to cut off the sacred top-knots of the men if trouble was 
bound to come thereby. I might have taught the Chris- 
tians to be obedient to their Sudra masters in the first 
place, and to consider their duty fulfilled if they came to 



184 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

the village meeting on free Sundays. I might have been 
conciliatory about the beating of those drums, telling the 
men to disengage themselves quietly from this old-time 
obligation, but if pressed into this service to yield. I 
might have done all this, and it would have made it far 
easier for us all. But it would have introduced a flabby 
kind of Christianity not worthy of the name. 

If I had sailed smoothly along, compromising every- 
where, the great experiences of the ingathering would 
have dwindled down to nothing. The social status of the 
Madigas would have remained unchanged. They would 
have lacked occasion to take a stand that called for a re- 
adjustment of their position in the community. But our 
social revolution came to pass at heavy cost. 

All through the years the Telugu Bible which lay on 
my office table was well worn in several places. Three 
pages, especially, were soiled with many a finger mark. 
One was "Come unto me all ye that labor" ; another was 
"In my Father's house are many mansions"; the third 
was "Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and perse- 
cute you for my name's sake." 



XII 

THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 

By the time our first five years in Ongole were over 
the foundations had been laid. The eight taluks over 
which the movement spread had by that time been touched 
with our activities. The field was dotted with Christian 
centers. We had a membership of more than fifteen 
hundred, and many adherents. The staff of workers who 
stood with me during all the years that followed had 
already gathered around us. It was yet seven years to 
the ingathering. We were getting ready for it. 

In those early years of the movement we were singu- 
larly free from the admixture of Western ideas. This 
was not wholly in accordance with my intentions. If I 
had had my way I would have had a theological school 
in full operation a year after we settled in Ongole. I 
begged for one, year after year. Not until ten years had 
gone by, and the ingathering had become a fact, did the 
first class of seminary graduates come to join the old 
preachers of the mission. By that time the movement 
had become unwieldy. Western organization had to be- 
gin. The old days were then over. 

I wanted a seminary in order to give our preachers a 
wider outlook as Christians. It was to make up to them 
for the lack of birth in a Christian land. Their horizon 
was bounded by their simple Indian village life. Of the 
great world beyond they knew nothing. In a hazy way 
they understood that there was a strange country from 
which the white man came, that the religion of the white 

185 



l86 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

man was the Christian rehgion, that the caste people re- 
fused to have anything to do with this rehgion and looked 
upon it with hatred. This was the group of ideas which 
constituted the mental attitude of the average Madiga 
toward Christianity. I wanted our preachers to realize 
their place in the world as Christians, to learn geography 
and find out that on two continents Christianity was the 
only religion. I wanted them to know something about 
the way in which the apostles founded churches, and how 
it all came about that after a man believes in Jesus Christ 
he must fulfill certain duties, which are called Christian 
duties. I tried to bring the men in touch with this knowl- 
edge. It was hard work. I had nothing in their lives to 
help me. Steady drill in an institution was required. 
This we could not get. Perhaps the Lord Jesus did not 
want us to have it. The men kept their narrow horizon. 
They gave to Jesus Christ a central place in their little 
world of ideas. With him as the dominant figure their 
simple ideas and simple lives became avenues of force. 
I watched it, and felt no fears. Yet no one knew better 
than I that I was off the beaten track in letting our men 
carry such heavy responsibility as Christian preachers on 
so narrow a basis of Christian training. 

Several of our leading men never came to our school 
in Ongole. Periah was one of these. They were so com- 
plete in the fitness for their calling, and were doing so 
great a work on the field, that it would have seemed out 
of place for -me to ask them to step aside awhile and 
learn to read. But the majority of that early group of 
men came for a time. Afterwards it was counted an 
honor when a man could say that he was one of those who 
were in our school during the first three years. We never 
again had such a group of men together, and we never 
put so much heart into the training of any other company 
of men. They had stood at the top of the Madiga com- 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 1 87 

munity, and were called now to stand at the top of the 
Christian community. They were the ones who were 
afterwards called, with great affection, "the big — or elder 
— preachers" of the mission. 

They began by learning the complicated Telugu alpha- 
bet. Then they advanced to "Messages for All" as a 
text-book. It was a proud day for them when I gave 
them each a Bible and they found they could spell out 
verses and whole chapters. They were eager to learn 
everything that came their way. The preachers who had 
come from Nellore with us, and their wives, taught these 
men and women much about the Christian way of living. 
They supplied an element of instruction that was needed. 
Mrs. Clough taught them; she took the wives of those 
men into training. It was yet the day of small things; 
our hands were not so full otherwise. Whatever of 
teaching capacity I had those men of the early days were 
given the benefit of it. Never after did I put so much 
of myself into a class of men as I did into these. It was 
one reason why they and I could work together after- 
wards as one man. 

The instruction which they received, though of the 
type of American Christianity, was nevertheless of an 
Eastern mold. Our lives were simple; our religious 
services were equally simple. Had they seen social for- 
mality with us, or religious ceremonial, it might have 
confused them. Moreover, it was not our motive to in- 
troduce these men and women, in the year or two while 
they were living in our compound, to as many Western 
forms of thought as they were able to absorb. It was 
the other way: we were seeking everywhere for the 
points of contact where the direct application could be 
made of Western thought to Eastern ways. When they 
returned to their villages they had been in no way weaned 
from their old environment. On the contrary, they saw 



l88 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

possibilities everywhere of welding together, as a new 
but compact whole, the essentials of Western Christianity 
with the spiritual background which was already theirs. 

I took those men touring with me while they were in 
school. They served their apprenticeship under me in 
this practical way. Those early tours were a mixture 
between West and East. The habits of my colporter 
days in northern Iowa were still strong upon me. At 
the same time, the habits of those men were marked with 
the ways of the Hindu Guru. Some of them had been 
Gurus themselves. All had had more or less to do with 
Gurus. If I had been lacking in elasticity the efforts of 
us all would have been crippled. I did not try to make 
Americans of those men. The effect would have been 
grotesque. They would have been neither Hindu nor 
American, and their own mothers would have been puz- 
zled about their status. As it was, they remained simple, 
humble Madigas — but Christianized. There was a simi- 
lar process in my case. I remained an American. The 
Hindus respected that in me which spoke to them of my 
own country. Yet I met them halfway. The aggres- 
siveness of the American colporter was changed into the 
more reposeful ways of the oriental teacher. Had I re- 
tained my Western methods of evangelistic work the 
Hindus would have tolerated and endured my presence 
among them — nothing more. When now I fell into line 
at every point, watching the preachers in their ways, and 
dealing with everyone as I saw it was expected of me, 
the effort became organic. It fitted in. We lived and 
breathed together as one organism. 

There was a call for these men all over the field. The 
people were eagerly waiting for them. They were their 
own, and had been given up to us for a time. Messages 
were continually sent to me asking when they would have 
learned enough and could come back. There was a spirit 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 189 

of perseverance among the men. They knew, even bet- 
ter than I, that the converts were pressing in, and that 
there was no one on the field to shepherd them. The day 
came when I talked it over with fifteen of them. Several 
hesitated; they wanted to learn more, and had capacity 
to do so. They all wanted me to promise to give them 
another opportunity. I said I would if it lay in my 
power. Not one of them needed to wait for a call. Their 
places were ready for them. The question adjusted itself 
according to family and village relationship. Where a 
man was known as belonging to certain families in a 
group of villages there he wanted to be located as pastor. 
It was an Indian way of doing it. I did not interfere. 
Thaluri Daniel went back to Dondleru ; Sreeram Solomon 
went to Darsi; Baddepudy Abraham became an evange- 
list in the northern taluks; Anumiah went to Cumbum. 
They all found their rightful places. 

By a natural process new Christian centers were form- 
ing everywhere. We did nothing to organize them : they 
simply grew. In each case there was a man there who 
by a sort of common consent became the leader. These 
men had not come straight out of the ordinary village 
worship. They had either come along the road of Raja 
Yoga teaching, or they had been in our school, or both. 
The people looked up to them now, and willingly received 
Christian teaching from them. The men saw to the up- 
keep of the Sunday services in one village after another. 
They took steps to help the people find some one to teach 
their children to read. Each village sent some of the 
best of their boys and girls, and their young men and 
women to our Ongole school. It required some years of 
patience, and they came back with attainments so far 
ahead of anything the others had known that all felt a 
great day had dawned. 

During those early years I never lost sight of the need 



190 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

for native agency. I could find no other solMion of our 
problem. The need had to be met without the help of a 
theological school. I was always on the alert, looking 
for men and women who had the qualities of leadership 
in them. I enlisted every man and woman who stood 
above the average, or possessed personality which could 
be drawn into service in their own sphere of life. Often 
they were unconscious of any latent abilities. I let them 
know that I wanted them, and the agencies, already at 
work, did the rest. They took hold of the Christian 
motive. Native agency was made a great force in Chris- 
tianizing the Madigas. It became a prominent feature 
of the Ongole methods. 

The harvest of workers in those early years came 
chiefly from the Kanigiri and Podili taluks. They had 
enough there to supply their own needs, and to spare. 
There was a background of spiritual strength in the 
Christians of those two taluks which marked the men 
and women who went forth from them. Intermarriage 
among the leading Christian families of our field was 
now beginning to have an effect. The sense of family 
cohesion was strong among our early Christians. It be- 
came a legitimate factor in Christian propaganda. When 
men from those two taluks found a place for labor re- 
mote from home, it was generally the case that family 
relationship with themselves, or with the wife, had 
formed a strong motive. I saw that this was the oriental 
way of doing, and raised no objections. 

The women had a good deal to say in these matters. 
If a man wanted to settle as preacher or teacher away 
from home I always asked him what his wife thought 
about it. If she objected and the man was making this 
move against her will or the will of her family, the chances 
for success were small. I learned by experience that it 
would take only a year or two, and then for some reason. 



J 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST IQI 

sickness perhaps, he and she returned home — a failure. 
I had good reason for enlisting the women from the be- 
ginning, and making them come to our schools with 
their husbands. Even if they had not capacity to learn 
more than their alphabet, they absorbed so much of the 
new ideas that at least they did not hinder their husbands 
afterwards. The Woman's Baptist Foreign Missionary 
Society of the West began in those early years to supply 
funds for our girls' boarding school in Ongole, and is 
continuing to do this to-day. To the Hindus, as they 
looked on, the education of the Madiga girls and women 
was one of the strangest features of the new religion. 

Sometimes there were women who had more capacity 
to learn than their husbands. I utilized that. After they 
had settled in some central place, the men went here and 
there to preach. The women began a school under a 
large, shady tree in the village. Then the people wanted 
a schoolhouse. They saved up money; they begged me 
to help them with funds from America. The men of the 
village built the walls with stone laid in mud, they bought 
a beam and rafters and thatch for the roof. They were 
proud of this house. It served for the school ; the Sunday 
services were held in it; it formed a rallying-place and 
marked that village as a Christian center. Often when 
the caste people saw this, it was the signal for petty perse- 
cutions. They said: "Have these low people become 
greater than we ?" 

In all this work of social uplifting, the village elders 
took a leading part. There were five of these in every 
village, and together they formed the panchayat, or coun- 
cil. It was self-administration similar to that of the main 
village, where the Sudras lived — pointing to the same 
Dravidian origin of both Sudras and Madigas. The 
office was for life and in a way hereditary. If a man's 
son was not considered competent to take his father's 



192 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

place at death, some one else could be substituted by com- 
mon consent of the village. These elders became of 
great importance to the movement. I came upon them 
everywhere. When the preachers went out in new direc- 
tions, the elders of the villages they entered were bound 
to see that they were given to eat. They inquired after 
the preacher's errand, and had to yield to the demand 
that the village people be called together to hear about 
the new religion. If then the preachers came to me and 
told me that people in distant villages were believing in 
Jesus Christ, and they could add that several of the 
elders, too, believed, and had consented to have their 
juttus cut off, I knew that they had a strong hold upon 
that village. When I went out on tour, the village elders 
everywhere came to the front and did the honors, extend- 
ing the hospitality of the village to me. They were con- 
sulted when there were candidates for baptism. The 
preachers knew those applicants, but the village elders 
knew them better. They came forward and gave testi- 
mony, for or against. 

The preachers everywhere relied upon the elders; nor 
did they ask for anything in return for their services. 
Under the old regime they had been granted some few 
acres of land in return for their services. They were 
well-to-do compared to the rest. All this was now ab- 
sorbed by the Christian movement. The baptism of a 
village elder meant that his power in the village was now 
to be used for the Master. He was given the Chris- 
tian motive. The Christian ethical code was to be fol- 
lowed. He was bound to learn from the preachers what 
it meant to lead the Christian life, and then to bring 
the whole village to that standard. Such a man was a 
deacon. The time came when it was an honor to be a 
Christian elder on that Ongole field. It meant to a man 
that he stood at the front of a social uprising of his 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST I93 

people. Suffering on this account was accepted with 
fortitude. 

If I had not adapted myself to this oriental feature 
of the movement, Christianizing the village elders and 
letting them stay in their old-time places, I would have 
missed a great opportunity. Nor did I sit down and 
think it all out. It came about naturally, and the Lord 
Jesus gave me wisdom to see the bearings of it all. 

There was another question, however, to which I gave 
a great deal of thought ; I studied it ; I looked at it from 
every point of view. It did not come about naturally. 
I was willing to do everything in my power to bring 
it to pass somehow. It oppressed me like some stern 
unfulfilled duty. This great problem, which I never 
fully solved, was the organization of churches. 

I wanted to make a beginning in the Podili taluk by 
organizing a church at Dondleru. I saw that the inter- 
related families of that taluk, who had come to us, would 
lend themselves more readily to organization, than simi- 
lar groups of families in other parts of the field. They 
were prosperous and could do much to support their 
schools and their preachers. Some of the best teachers 
in the mission, who afterwards served on the staff of 
station schools and our theological seminary, came from 
the Podili taluk. I was justified in thinking this the 
place for an experiment. Twenty years later, when 
churches were organized on the whole field, those that 
came closest to the Western model were located in that 
taluk. 

But I did not dare to attempt it in those early years. 
Of spiritual life there was no lack. Some of the 
preachers had abundant insight and sanctified common 
sense. But to set off a church, not as a branch of the 
Ongole church, but as an independent self-sustaining 
Baptist church, was something which at that time I had 



194 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

not the courage to undertake. The question of recep- 
tion of members was in itself sufificient to cause hesita- 
tion. There is an old letter from Dr. Jewett among my 
papers, in which he answers for the second time my 
anxious question whether to organize a church at Dond- 
leru or not. He replied to go and study the situation, 
and then, if it seemed right, to place Ezra or Rungiah 
in charge as pastor and let that Christian center become 
an organized church. That was the point: I could not 
spare Ezra or Rungiah from the work at headquarters. 
Moreover, neither Ezra nor Rungiah had passed through 
Raja Yoga teaching; they had led the Christian life since 
boyhood. In their Western mode of thought they were 
distinct from the rest of the Ongole preachers. Dis- 
sensions might have been the result. Nor did one or 
two churches meet the requirement. The preachers 
would have asked me why I did not organize others. 
I decided that there was too much at stake. It could 
not be done. 

Often I felt anxious for the outcome. Here was a 
Christian community growing to ever larger propor- 
tions, without being brought into conformity to the insti- 
tutions of the Christian Church. I called the preachers 
to Ongole every hot season for six weeks to a preachers' 
institute. I studied portions of the Bible with them and 
taught them Christian doctrine. They were teachable 
and were anxious to do all that was expected of them. 
When, twenty years later, these men were ordained to 
the ministry, twenty-four at one time, it was found that 
they had the knowledge required of them, though it 
had been given them in a fragmentary way. 

From the beginning they were strong in certain direc- 
tions. Their efficiency in going about and telling the 
people about Jesus Christ was great. They were at the 
head in the social uprising which Christian teaching 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST I95 

inevitably brought. They knew about movements, about 
sects developing through some eminent teacher or re- 
former, about disciples and adherents gathering around 
some religious teacher who placed their feet upon a 
way of salvation. All this they knew, as it was part 
of Indian religious life, and they applied their knowl- 
edge to the Christian propaganda. 

They did not, however, find it easy to understand why 
they should group themselves as churches, each church 
a distinct unit, self-governing and self-sustaining, thus 
fostering their religious life. They did not readily grasp 
the reason why it was not enough to love and serve the 
Lord Jesus. They adjusted themselves, and learned 
slowly about lists of members and stated contributions, 
about voting on the business of the church, excluding 
members and receiving them, observing the sacraments 
and all the varied duties of membership. It was all so 
different from their own ways of self-administration, 
with their five village elders, and their panchayat, and 
the Gurus going back and forth. We compromised. I 
adopted their system, and they adopted mine. It pro- 
duced a mixture. There was blessing in it. 

That band of old Ongole preachers, about thirty in 
number, who came to us before our first five years were 
over, formed a continuity of great power, and of an 
endurance that was never shaken. They stood as a 
group from beginning to end. At the time when the 
American Baptists were yet considering whether to aban- 
don or reenforce their Telugu Mission, and when I was 
wrestling with my ambition for a political career, the 
nucleus of this band of preachers was already formed. 
They had stepped out of their old village worship, and 
then had disengaged themselves from the iron grip of the 
village community by going north on trade. There the 
group was increasing in numbers, and all were eager to 



196 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

find out something about the new rehgion. I had barely 
settled in Ongole when they came upon me almost as 
one man — and they stayed. They were in our school 
together. They gave their sons and daughters to each 
other in marriage, till that whole staff of preachers 
was like one great family. When the famine came, those 
thirty men were the overseers in digging three miles of 
canal and they were the friends of all the people. Then 
came the ingathering and again they stood as one man. 
I was left year after year, alone, over a church of twenty 
thousand members. No disaster came: these men were 
all at their post. The field was divided; they stayed in 
their places as before. The new missionaries learned 
to love these old men, and to lean on them. They 
formed a continuity of Ongole methods. There were 
never any serious dissensions among them. They were 
honored in their old age by the younger generation. 

Those old preachers made the movement, and the 
movement made them, and all together they made me, 
and Jesus, our Master, was in the midst of it. 

A change came with the day of the younger men, 
who had taken a course of three or four years in our 
theological seminary. They could preach sermons 
with logical divisions and a conclusion. They had 
studied the Old Testament and dwelt much on the chil- 
dren of Israel. They understood about the Church and 
the Christian ordinances. I was glad to see them in 
their trained strength. But the old men stood unmoved. 
They knew their own worth. 

Groups of them came to Ongole to tell their story, 
that it might be incorporated with mine. We were 
knitted together — nothing else was possible. Sometimes 
they dropped the thread of the story and went into 
reminiscences together. They reminded each other how 
the man who was already in debt by paying some Guru 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST IQ/ 

a heavy price had to go still further into debt because 
all the others came and wanted to know what he had 
learned, and he had to give them to eat while they 
stayed. There were flashes of humor. They laughed 
together. Sitting at the feet of Raja Yoga Gurus, even 
though many of them were worthless, had been a rich 
experience to them which they would not willingly have 
missed out of their lives. We asked one or two of 
those who had been considered worthy of initiation what 
was said to them. They made the Telugu gesture which 
means silence. Neither Periah nor any of the others 
would give the slightest intimation of the mystery of 
their initiation. They were silent with dignity. It was 
a place in their past with which they refused to break. 
Their faith in Jesus, the Christ, had come into their 
lives, as something very precious, which had cost them 
dear. With tears, fighting down the sobs, they told 
how their families cast them out, how their Sudra mas- 
ters turned against them, how the Brahmans oppressed 
them, and how yet they came through as conquerors. 
Those old men knew that their stories were unusual. 
They had had a chance to compare them with the un- 
eventful lives of the younger generation. Their eyes 
shone. They were like old war-horses with the smell 
of powder in their nostrils. 

Yet these men had not been in a theological seminary. 
The Lord Jesus had kept them in their oriental setting. 
They stood for a movement little hampered by Western 
organization. 

In their place, at the point of impact of West upon 
East, the group of old Ongole preachers had to bear 
the shock of it in every direction. The Hindus combined 
in their resistance. Our religion was a topic of conver- 
sation among them. What they said to one another 
about it they used against the preachers and me, as we 



198 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

went about. Often when I had a group of listeners 
before me, some Brahman engaged me in debate, flinging 
questions at me as fast as I could answer them. These 
were some of them: 



'Will you young English upstarts teach us religion? 
Were the Hindus not a great people, skilled in all the 
sciences, with a grand system of religion, when your an- 
cestors were wild men, clothed with skins, and running in 
the jungle ? Did you not get all that you know from India ? 
If the Bible is true, would not God have given it long ago 
to us? Would it not have been given to the Hindus writ- 
ten in the sacred Sanscrit, when you were jungle men? Is 
not all that it contains and much more written in the Vedas ? 
Shall we throw away these sacred books, written a thousand 
years before this Jesus Christ was born? Shall we break 
our caste and all become Pariahs ? The Bible may be good 
for the English, but we do not need it." 

I could hold my own before such attacks; for I was 
a white man and aware of the resources of my race. 
The preachers had neither the knowledge nor the status 
to face them. They were often in difficulty, especially 
when at the outposts of the field. I always advised 
them to avoid discussion; for I knew how unequal the 
combat must be. The caste people set traps for them; 
they asked some seemingly simple question, and when 
the preachers answered it, they found themselves caught. 
They were held up to the derision of the village. Sticks 
and stones were brought forward. There were times 
when they had a mob falling upon them, and they could 
save themselves only by running to the police station. 

Year after year I pleaded for an institution in which 
to train a Telugu Christian ministry. As early as March 
9, 1869, I closed a letter to Boston as follows: 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST I99 

"The Lord has as yet sent us only the poor, the ignorant 
of the ignorant, and the despised. But we are satisfied 
for that is God's plan. See I Cor. ist chapter, Luke 14: 
16-25. I write to wise men, to men of God. I need not 
weaken my cause by writing more. I close as I began, cry- 
ing Help ! Help ! Come over and help us or our very pros- 
perity will be our ruin." 

Another year passed, and nothing was done. Indi- 
vidual appeals to the Executive Committee for a sem- 
inary had had no effect. We now decided to move upon 
them as a conference. We were only four men, but we 
organized ourselves as an association in March, 1870. 
Dr. Jewett was elected moderator. Rev. John McLaurin, 
who had arrived a month previously, was clerk. Mr. 
Timpany and I were the voting members, and we had 
several logs to roll, but our biggest log was that sem- 
inary. We put it through. 

"Moved by Brother Clough and seconded by Brother 
Timpany that we ask the Executive Committee for eight 
thousand rupees for a seminary and professor's house. 
Unanimous. 

"Moved and seconded and resolved that Brother Clough 
correspond with the Executive Committee on the subject." 

I wrote a strong appeal to Boston. It was printed 
in the Baptist Missionary Magazine. There was re- 
sponse. The money was granted, and before we met 
for our second association in March, 1871, the buildings 
were going up under the superintendence of Mr. Tim- 
pany. Dr. J. N. Murdock, then secretary, wrote to me, 
November 17, 1870: 

"The Lord is working wonders with you, as of old. It is 
his doing, and we may rejoice in it and magnify his name. 



200 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

If he were not in it, we should be almost alarmed, in view 
of such numerous accessions. The question 'How shall we 
secure such harvests and preserve the multitude from 
blight?' is often on our lips. How often I have said to 
myself during these last four months : 'What a pity we had 
not adopted Clough's recommendation two years ago to 
start a theological school among these people. Then, in- 
stead of six native helpers, on whom you can place intelli- 
gent reliance, we might have twenty, thirty, or forty !" 

The question was now discussed, both in America and 
among us in India, whether I was to be at the head 
of that seminary. I had not fully recovered from an 
attack of jungle fever two years previously and it was 
thought a change of occupation might help me. I found 
that Mr. Timpany judged my make-up correctly. He 
wrote to me: "You irrepressible Brother Clough could 
not screw yourself down to a theological chair for six 
months to save your life." I agreed wdth him. The 
restraint of the classroom would have been intolerable 
to me. I could hold a preachers' institute for six weeks 
every hot season, but beyond that I could not confine 
myself. 

A task of a dififerent nature was now laid upon me. 
We had been pleading for reenforcements. It was a 
slow process even to get a hearing. Our appeals were 
laid before the Executive Committee. Then they were 
published in the denominational papers. They were 
emphasized during the annual meetings. The effort 
lacked directness. In those days there was only now 
and then a man who felt that foreign missions had a, 
claim upon him personally. The women's societies had 
only recently been founded, with their women's circles 
and children's bands, bringing missionary information 
straight into the homes and with it a desire to help. 
Moreover, our constituency had not yet adjusted itself 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 201 

to the new point of view regarding the Telugu Mis- 
sion. It was no longer a question of abandoning us 
on account of lack of results: it was a question what 
to do with the harvest. 

The men on the field came to the conclusion that I 
must go to America and enlist four men for the Telugu 
Mission, and get an endowment for our seminary. We 
wanted at least one hundred students, and we would 
have to furnish their support throughout their course. 
It meant a heavy outlay, year after year, for many 
years to come. The income of $50,000 would put that 
enterprise on a sound financial basis. I was to go to 
America and secure this. Dr. Murdock wrote to me 
March 11, 1871 : 

"We have been deeply pained to hear how precarious 
your health is. On the score of economy to the service, 
therefore, your early return to the United States seems the 
dictate of wisdom. Besides, the most likely way to secure 
two or three families for the Telugus would be to come 
here and tell your story to ministers and people. You might 
be able to find in the great West men likeminded with your- 
self who would return to Ongole with you, perhaps pre- 
cede you, to help gather the harvests of the future among 
the Telugus." 

On the envelope containing this letter is written in 
my hand: "A bitter pill for me to take.*' I did not 
want to go. Nine months longer I worked before I 
turned my face toward America. 

A strenuous term of service had come to a close. 
West and East had met. The impact had changed the 
lives of hundreds, yes, thousands of people. A new 
standard of living had been given to the outcaste com- 
munity of that region. To many Christianity had 
brought "not peace, but a sword." On me^.. too, those 



202 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

years had left their mark. I was In a sense made over 
new. In many respects I was not the same man who 
landed in India seven years before. 

My manner of approaching the people had changed. 
I had learned their code of politeness. I saw that when 
the Hindu wanted to be courteous, he answered a ques- 
tion by a counter question. If I asked a man, "How 
large is your family?" — he replied, "Are there not ten 
in my household?" I often conducted conversation thus, 
because I saw how it satisfied their sense of fitness. In 
other ways also I felt that it was far better that I should 
adopt their manner of being polite, rather than permit 
them to make up some crude mixture between European 
and Indian ways of dealing. I liked the salaam as a 
greeting — touching the fingers of the right hand to the 
forehead, with a wave of the arm. The practice of 
shaking hands came in slowly. I learned their ways 
of showing hospitality. Out in the villages, when the 
Sudras combined .to show me the courtesy due to a guest, 
I took notice. I learned that I must not rise up and go 
when done with my visit. I must ask first whether they 
would give me permission to go. 

There was a tendency always of imitating English 
customs. The younger generation, after learning a few 
English words, thought they must now adopt English 
manners. This frequently meant a complete reversal 
of their old-time politeness. The danger was that it 
would set them adrift, omitting Hindu courtesies, yet 
knowing so little of English courtesies that these were 
of slight service. In those days, strict etiquette was at- 
tached to the use of the sandals. It was the custom 
for a man to- step out of his sandals when he approached 
a religious teacher. Sometimes it did young men good 
to be reminded that the ways of their fathers were not 
yet out of date. They wanted also to discard the turban 




JOHN E. CLOUGH (1873) 

"A strenuous term of service had come to a close. West and East had 
met. The impact had changed the lives of hundreds, yes, thousands of people. 
A new standard of living had been given to the oiitcaste community of that 
region. To many Christianity had brought 'not peace, but a sword.' On me, 
too, those years had left their mark. I was in a sense made over new. In 
many respects I zvas not the same man who landed in India seven years 
before." 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 203 

and don caps that were neither Hindu nor English. I 
held out firmly against such transformations. So far 
as lay in my power, I held our Christian community close 
to Hindu customs and manners. Wherever I could, I 
reduced the temptation to imitate our English customs. 
In this I had the trend of the times against me. Those 
who adopted the Christian religion adopted the ways 
of the West with it, more or less. The group of old 
Ongole preachers remained almost untouched by this ten- 
dency. This was one reason why their hold upon the 
village people remained so firm. 

In adapting myself to the ways of the people, my sense 
of humor had to be turned into the Telugu channel. It 
became one of the most useful tools in my equipment. 
I loved the people and wanted to approach them and 
take away their fear of me as a white man. I saw that 
a bit of fun would go a long way in making them feel 
at home with me. I got hold of their ideas of the 
ridiculous. I saw that a touch of sarcasm might be 
more effective than a sermon. But it had to be their 
own kind, not the American or English kind. I learned 
their intonations in making humorous remarks. Some- 
times I did a bit of acting and mimicry. There was no 
better introduction to the sermon that followed, when I 
was out in the villages preaching, than to get the crowd 
before me to smile and nod their heads with approval; 
for then they became all ears for that which followed. 
For a white man thus to enter into their ways was some- 
thing strange to them and they were willing to walk 
many a mile to hear and see for themselves. 

There was one direction in which I checked my sense 
of humor. When I began my work, I made fun of the 
Hindu gods, and thus tried to shake the faith of the 
people in them. It did not take me long to see that that 
was not the way to do. Some were angered by it need- 



204 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

lessly ; others lost faith in their old gods by what I said, 
but did not accept Jesus Christ in place of them, and 
were thus sent adrift. I stopped that method. I settled 
down to telling the people, singly or in groups, about the 
Lord Jesus and his life and death, and what he could 
be to them if they would receive him. That did the 
work. When they accepted him, their old idol-worship 
went at a stroke, and my destructive attempts were not 
necessary. 

Wherever I found anything in their simple lives that 
could be taken into service for the spread of Christianity, 
I was not slow to lay hold of it. When I went on 
tour I used their village customs to advertise me. In 
every Madiga hamlet there were men who were called 
Yetties, bearing burdens over the country for the Sudras 
and Brahmans in return for a small holding of land. 
These Yetties were wide awake, and knew what was 
going on everywhere. They were practically the news 
bearers of the community. Where newspapers were un- 
known, information had thus to be carried from man 
to man. The Yetties of that whole region were in my 
service. When they heard that I was about to pass that 
way, they told everyone. They served as reporters also. 
If anything important took place, that web of Yetties 
published it abroad as if it had been in a daily gazette. 
I was on friendly terms with them, and gave them an 
occasional present, and charged them to talk the truth 
about me, and not give out garbled accounts. It was 
a great success in the way of advertising. They often 
brought big crowds together for me when I went 
preaching. 

My views, too, were affected by the process of adapta- 
tion. I tried always to be orthodox, but there were 
points where Western and Eastern ideas met, and there 
I was conciliatory, and my thoughts ran in a groove 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 20$ 

with the people. This was the case with their belief in 
evil spirits and demons. It applied especially to cases 
where the Christians of a village found themselves fight- 
ing and separating into two or more factions. They said 
then that some demons had entered into them, and the 
demons liked it and would not leave. These were their 
old ideas of demonology for which much of their wor- 
ship stood. They held that the dead, who had been 
evil in life, were roaming close to the earth, seeking an 
entry. They feared demons of many kinds which had 
to be propitiated. 

For me to uproot these ideas would have been a hope- 
less task. I let them stand. When I faced the fighters 
in a village quarrel, and saw the women with disheveled 
hair and angry eyes, the men sullen and unreasonable, 
and full of hatred, I said the demons must come out by 
prayer to Jesus. Often the two sides in a village quarrel 
came walking many miles into Ongole to get justice 
from me. I saw that I might talk for days and not 
settle their disputes. Besides, there were others, with 
legitimate requests, waiting their turn, sitting under the 
trees in front of our bungalow, and they, too, had claim 
on me. I talked to those fighters in their own language : 
"You have swallowed several demons which must come 
out by prayer. Go under the big tree and stay there till 
they are out." I sent preachers and village elders to 
pray with them ; when these were worn out, I sent others. 
It was the beautiful big tamarind tree near the baptistery 
in our compound. I often sent people there to pray, till 
it grew a custom, no matter what the special case might 
be. If, after a day or two, they came to me and told 
me in a half-hearted way that all was right now, and 
they wanted to go home to their villages, I could soon 
tell whether it was true. I said, "The demons are still 
looking through your eyes, go and cast them out first/' 



206 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

It did the work. They said, "What can we do? Our 
Clough Dhora can see right through our eyes what is 
in us. We might as well give up.'* 

Even in those earlier years I was growing lax in 
church discipline. It somehow did not fit in well. In 
the beginning I worked on the pattern of the churches 
in America, and exclusions then were more frequent with 
us than in later years when we numbered thousands. 
This was not because I was growing careless; it was 
largely on principle. I found that there was a point 
where church discipline and my favorite doctrine of "the 
elect'' clashed. When I saw men make crooked tracks 
in their Christian life, and then finally die a triumphant 
death with full faith in Jesus as their Saviour, I decided 
that I had better be slow with that church discipline, lest 
I be found interfering with the designs of Jesus himself. 

There was another point on which I did not hold 
rigidly to Western theology. In my preaching I did not 
dwell equally on the three persons of the Trinity. I 
found that the people took up most gladly the story of 
our Lord Jesus. There was power in it. Experience 
taught me that when I met a man out on the road, or a 
few men, running from the fields as they saw me com- 
ing on horseback, and I told them in five or ten minutes 
from my saddle enough about my Master, Jesus, so that 
if they never heard more and they believed this they 
could be saved, it was the beginning of their conver- 
sion. The same was true of crowds, no matter how big. 
I talked about Jesus and I taught my helpers to talk 
about Jesus, and there was something wonderful in the 
way in which people took it. I must have preached 
hundreds of sermons an hour in length on the text: 
"Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, 
and I will give you rest." It was always new. 

Thus it came about that we preached Jesus only. We 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 20/ 

prayed to our Father in heaven ; we spoke sometimes of 
the Holy Spirit ; but it was Jesus who moved our hearts. 
This led to a charge of heterodoxy against me in the 
early years. It was at. our annual conference, soon after 
our much-needed theological seminary had been estab- 
lished. I had reluctantly parted with one of my best 
men, to assist as teacher in the seminary. He preached 
the Telugu sermon at the Conference. A large number 
of the Ongole preachers were there and listened. His 
recent experience in occupying his mind with doctrinal 
theology showed its results. He said that we ought to 
preach about God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit, 
just as we were now preaching about God the Son. He 
admonished the Ongole preachers to mend their ways in 
this respect. I saw the effect it was having on them 
and feared their zeal for Jesus might suffer a shock. 
When the sermon was over, I asked permission to speak, 
and I held to it that the preacher is right in preaching 
Jesus only, because in his name is salvation for men. 
Then the president of the seminary spoke and sided 
against me, and he laid the charge of heterodoxy against 
the teaching on my field. I defended myself and my 
preachers, for whose teaching I was responsible. This 
ecclesiastical dispute remained unsettled. I saw that I 
must be careful; for that seminary which I worked so 
hard to get could easily become a sort of tribunal for me. 
Those years previous to the famine and ingathering 
were prosperous years of steady increase. If we could 
have continued at that pace, there would have been nor- 
mal growth and development. It was good to live in 
those days. Things were coming to pass. Half the time 
we were living in the future, and having that exhilarat- 
ing sense of being in the midst of making history — mis- 
sion history. Perhaps my course might at times have 
become strenuous if Mrs. Clough had not been by my 



208 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

side, using her English sensibleness to offset my some- 
times impulsive independence. Some of the older mis- 
sionaries called her "the balance wheel of the Ongole 
Mission." 

On my long tours I left her in charge of the com- 
pound and all that pertained to it. While thus holding 
the fort, she followed me all over the district with 
baskets, carried by coolies, containing water and bread 
and supplies, with my mail. And she knew where my 
source of strength lay, and what Bible verses to quote 
to me when I stood in, need of encouragement. All 
through my missionary career there was one verse that 
carried me farthest. It was : "Be still and know that I 
am God; I will be exalted among the heathen!" On 
at least one occasion this verse was brought home to me 
with peculiar force. 

Away off in the direction of Cumbum, during one of 
my early long tours, I was tempted one day to shake 
the dust off my feet and go. My helpers and I had 
camped in a new place, and had been trying hard to 
get the people to come and listen to the gospel, but they 
would not. I concluded that it was a hard place, and 
told my staff of workers that we were justified in 
leaving it alone and moving on elsewhere. Toward noon 
I went into my tent, closed down the sides, let the little 
tent punkah swing over my head and rested, preparatory 
to starting off for the next place. Soon I began to hear 
the hum of many voices. But I took no special notice 
because I had given up the place. Just then a basket 
with supplies was brought to my tent by a coolie, all the 
way from Ongole, who had walked seventy miles with 
the basket on his head. In the accompanying letter, 
Mrs. Clough quoted my favorite verse to me. "Be still, 
and know that I am God." While reading this, some 
of the preachers put their heads into the tent and said. 



THE IMPACT OF WEST UPON EAST 209 

"Sir, there is a big crowd out here ; the grove is full ; all 
are waiting for you. Please come out." Times of 
spiritual consolation like this came to me often, and I 
always took them as being sent by Jesus himself. 

Take it altogether, those first seven years were the 
happiest in my missionary career. They brought me a 
full share of troubles, of hard work and of narrow es- 
capes with my life. But on the other hand, I found 
great joy in preaching Jesus, and while I tried to follow 
as he led, I was often amazed at the marvels which he 
was working. Sometimes they went beyond my under- 
standing and I rejoiced with trembling. Perhaps at 
those times I touched the highest point possible in mis- 
sionary experience. 



XIII 



REENFORCEMENTS 



The night before we left Ongole, January 24, 1872, 
to start on our journey to America, was a decisive time. 
The depths of feeling were stirred. About five hundred 
representatives from Christian villages, who had come 
to Ongole to say good-by to us, refused to let us go. 
It was near midnight, yet they would not give up: 
their courage failed them. They urged : "Do not leave 
us! Stay with us. Do not go to America!" Those 
nearest in the crowd clung to my feet. They pressed 
upon me on every side, trying to hold me. In a few 
short years they had taken strides in a new life; they 
did not see how they could continue in this without us ; 
they could not bear the prospect of going back to their 
old life. 

I saw that I must make them see clearly once more 
the motive for our going, and must give them some 
kind of partnership in it, or else the consequences might 
be serious. I had told them the reasons for our going 
many times before. Now I called upon them all to be 
silent and listen carefully, that I might open my heart 
to them. 

I said to them, "Do you remember when I was at 
your village that you asked me to come again soon, and 
I told you that I could not; that I had one hundred and 
ninety villages to visit before I could see you again?" 
"Yes, yes." 

210 



I 



REENFORCEMENTS 211 

"And do you remember that you begged me to send 
you a preacher and I told you I could not, for we had 
but eighteen, and they, too, must be scattered through 
all these one hundred and ninety villages? And that 
finally, when you followed me out of the village begging 
me to come, or send a preacher or teacher, I could do 
nothing but shut out your prayers and gallop along?" 

They said, "Yes, we remember." 

"And now you know that I am worn out with work; 
that unless I can rest, I shall soon not be able to visit 
you at all. You know, too, that we must have four new 
missionaries, and a theological seminary to train 
preachers who can stay with you all the time; and that 
I must go to America and get the men and the money," 

Now they begged, "Go quick and come quick; go 
quick, and come quick." 

A different spirit had come over them. Now was my 
opportunity to lay upon them the responsibility of part- 
nership. I said to them: "When we are gone, will you 
pray every day that God will restore our health, and 
that he will send the four new missionaries, and also the 
money for the seminary ?" Enthusiastically they agreed. 
They believed in prayer. They saw that they would be 
instrumental in bringing us back soon. Thus we parted 
that night. 

When we left Ongole, Dr. McLaurin, with Mrs. Mc- 
Laurin, took charge of the field. They were facing a 
difficult situation, which required patience and firmness 
and kindness. During the previous year Dr. McLaurin 
had gone with me on several long tours which practically 
covered the field. I introduced him everywhere to the 
Christians and to the caste people, as one whom they 
could trust. He assisted me in talking to the people, as 
he already had some knowledge of the Telugu. I asked 
him to baptize the converts during these tours. This 



212 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

was almost a necessity in order to convince the preachers 
that those who were baptized by Dr. McLaurin were 
admitted into the church on the same footing as those 
baptized by me. 

When now the people realized that we were gone, 
some began again to murmur. In their enthusiasm on 
that last night, they told us to go quickly and come 
quickly. But now they had the grim reality before 
them. They were to go back to their fields. The caste 
people everywhere would ask them, "Where now is your 
Guru? Has he taken none of his disciples with him? 
Now will you work on Sunday? Will you let your 
juttus grow?" Their economic relations had been 
changed to such a degree that now, with me dropped out 
of their lives for a time, the foundations were tottering 
under their feet. Dr. McLaurin wrote to me, a day or 
two after our departure, that discontent had broken out 
into open rebellion. He wanted me to cope with this 
before I left the country. 

I wrote him to send several of the leading preachers 
to Madras to be with us there till we sailed. It meant 
expense, for I could not ask the men to walk nearly two 
hundred miles. They came in bullock carts, and were 
my guests in Madras in their humble way. I saw what 
was required. When the steamer was in the harbor, 
I obtained permission to take these men on board. I 
showed them our cabin, with our luggage already in it. 
I showed them the saloon, where we would eat. It was 
a great thing to them; for it brought that whole story 
about our going to America down from the region of 
myths and made it a practical fact. After we came back 
on shore, I sat down with them and impressed on their 
minds what they were to tell the Christians, and how 
to answer the caste people. They now had a big story 
to tell. No one in all that region had seen what I ob- 



REENFORCEMENTS 213 

tained permission to show to them: the way in which 
white men cross the ocean. I charged them to tell 
everyone on the field that as the first part of my story 
was true, they might believe the second part : we were 
coming back on a ship from America. It changed the 
face of the whole situation. They went back and were 
busy several months telling everywhere what they had 
seen. The panic passed. Dr. McLaurin now found 
these men earnest, willing fellow-workers. 

It drew heavily on my faith at that time to look back 
and also to look ahead. The first break was now to 
come into our family circle. We had four children : our 
son, Allen, our daughters, Nellora and Ongola, named 
after the two mission stations, and their little brother, 
Warren. When we returned to India, our youngest 
daughter. Gratia, was born, but the two eldest had been 
left behind in America. Our family circle was never 
again complete. 

My health was much impaired. Jungle fever was in 
my system. It was a question how long this would hold 
me in its grip. I wanted to be back in my place in India, 
yet I had agreed to do a strenuous stroke of work in 
America. I was wholly uncertain how I would be re- 
ceived when I made my request known to the churches. 
During five years I had received nearly 1,700 people into 
membership, all as poor and ignorant as could be. I had 
not organized them into churches. It weighed on my 
mind that I had not been able to bring those converts 
into conformity with the home churches. How would 
the pastors and leading members of our churches view 
this? It was a problem how to give my call for help 
a form that would appeal to the home constituency. My 
case was unusual. The mission to which I belonged was 
not popular. If I failed, it would not be surprising. 

I was not even certain of the men at our mission 



214 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

rooms in Boston. They had never interfered with me 
or poured cold water upon me — not a drop. Still, there 
was a note of anxiety sometimes in their letters, which 
did not escape me. Their position was that if this 
work was of the Holy Spirit, then no man had the right 
to question it. Those men at the head of our society 
were the trustees of our denomination, and stood for 
its principles. If ever Baptist democratic principles were 
applied to the uttermost, it was done in my case. Half- 
way round the world, hidden in the jungle, no man 
over me to control me, I was receiving the people, hun- 
dreds at a time, and was calling them Baptists, and 
looked to the denomination in America to ratify what 
I had done by furnishing the means to establish them 
in the faith. Dr. Warren wrote me a letter after the 
tidings had reached America that more than six hundred 
had been added to our membership during 1869. It gave 
me courage. I saw that I had the brethren with me. 
It also held me to a careful, cautious proceeding. He 
stated to me the New Testament principles to which 
I must consider myself bound. He wrote March 25, 
1870: 

"I took your letter to the Committee and read it to them 
entire. They are all impressed deeply by the wonders God 
is doing in connection with your labors among the Telugus. 
One member remarked that we had seen nothing so pente- 
costal since the incoming of the Karens thirty years ago, 
and feel that we ought to thank God and take courage. 

"At the same time, all seem to be aware that an increased 
responsibility is thrown upon you, upon ourselves, and 
upon the Baptist churches of this country. These bap- 
tized Telugus are all at the best but so many infants, need- 
ing a world of care, watching, sympathy, and instruction. 
To save them to themselves and make them a blessing to 
others they must be trained, and for this they must have 



REENFORCEMENTS 21 5 

teachers, preachers, colporters and all Qiristian appliances. 
Every group should have a guide, churches should be 
formed, pastors given, chapels and schoolhouses erected. 
There is no end to the work that lies out before you, and 
before ourselves. We cannot turn away from it and be 
guiltless. God help us to see and do our duty. . . . 

"While I would not advise you to baptize any who do not 
give evidence of piety, while some indeed might advise cau- 
tion in admitting people so ignorant to membership in the 
church of Christ, I would unhesitatingly say to you. Go in 
on the tide, 'cast the net into the sea and gather of every 
kind,' and 'when it is full, draw it to the shore and sit 
down and gather the good into vessels and cast the bad 
away/ Do not refuse to put down the net because you 
may gather the bad with the good. If you do, you will 
gather nothing, either good or bad. From the very nature 
of the case, there must be some uncertainty, a good deal 
in fact, in reference to what you shall enclose in your net. 
With that uncertainty fully in view go forward in obedience 
to the instructions of the Master, who understood perfectly 
this whole business, and cast the gospel net. There is im- 
mense advantage in getting a mass of people within the 
circle of your influence and under your control. That, to 
my mind, is the great idea at the bottom of the Samou/s 
teachings. Then you have something to work on, and some- 
thing to work with, both material and implements. I have 
all confidence in you, for, while I see you are disposed to 
push things forward, you seem to understand and realize in 
whom your strength is. May Christ Jesus supply all your 
needs." 



An incident occurred while we were in London, wait- 
ing for our Atlantic steamer, which had a strong effect 
on me in giving me a hopeful spirit. We went to the 
Baptist Tabernacle to hear Rev. C. H. Spurgeon, whose 
fame as a preacher in those days had gone the world 
over. After the sermon I called on him. One of the 



2l6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

officers of the church stood by, and when I was leaving, 
he went with me. He asked me what I intended to do. 
I told him about the $50,000 for the seminary. He 
hesitated a little, as if under some impression which he 
himself could not define. Then he said, "If you stay 
here in London, you can get that money in two months.'' 
I told him I could not stay. He said, *T want a hand 
in that affair." He took out his purse, emptied the con- 
tents into my hand, gave me his card, and asked me to 
write to him. I told him I was not collecting money 
yet. He said, "Never mind, keep that and write to me 
of your success." Somehow this encouraged me won- 
derfully. The man acted as if I were bound to get that 
money, no matter how or where. 

We reached America, and I went to Boston and met 
the Executive Committee. They knew what my inten- 
tions were, for my task had been laid upon me by the 
association of our Telugu Mission, and had been duly 
reported to them. They received me in all kindness, but 
told me I must give up my project. There was a man 
recently who wanted $10,000 for something, and after 
working six months, had collected only $1,000 together. 
Besides, a special project of that size would interfere 
with the usual receipts of the society. They said: "It 
cannot be done. Give that up." This order was so em- 
phatic, I had to yield. Deeply disappointed, I went my 
way. With my family I settled in Strawberry Point, 
Iowa, in my old home. 

The Baptists in Iowa and Illinois now became aware 
of the fact that we were back. They had stood by us 
nobly with their support during eight years, and now 
wanted me to come and tell them all about it. I was 
growing strong; Iowa was taking the jungle fever out 
of my system. This was my old tramping ground. I 
began to go visiting churches and conventions. The 



REENFORCE^ENTS 21^ 

people wanted to do something; public opinion was tak- 
ing hold of that seminary project, though I held back. 
At an association in Iowa I told them the story of that 
Christian community out in India who needed an institu- 
tion to train their ministry. I told the brethren that 
I was not allowed to solicit funds for .this purpose, and 
that I now was not asking anything. I was only stating 
what I and the whole Telugu Mission wanted. Then 
one of the leading men rose up and said, *'I move we 
indorse this project, and that we give the brethren oppor- 
tunity to subscribe." Money began to pour in upon me. 
Before I had asked for so much as a single dollar, money 
and pledges were in my hands amounting to $5,000. 

I wrote to Boston. Several men in the West were in 
favor of letting that seminary endowment come out of 
the Middle West. There was correspondence, back and 
forth. Meanwhile the money was coming in a steady 
stream. Five months after landing in America I re- 
ceived official permission to raise that $50,000. Then I 
went to work in earnest. I traveled from city to city, 
from church to church. A spirit of giving was abroad, 
from large sums given by wealthy men and women down 
to the mite boxes of children, who invariably emptied 
them for the Telugu seminary if their parents permitted. 
On the day when the great financial panic began, Sep- 
tember 22, 1873, ^y task was accomplished. It was 
a question then whether the panic would affect the 
pledges still outstanding. It did. There was consid- 
erable shrinkage. But the amount secured was large, 
and the financial future of our Telugu seminary was 
assured. 

It had been laid upon me to find four men for the 
Telugus. The fact is, the money came faster than the 
men. When I had the endowment well in sight, and had 
no further misgivings about that, I was still looking for 



2l8 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

the men. Twenty years later I enlisted twenty-five men 
for the Telugu Mission. The Student Volunteer Move- 
ment had done the preliminary work. I found it easier 
at that time to get the twenty-five than I did now to get 
the four. In March, 1873, I made an appeal to the 
pastors and theological students through the denomina- 
tional press. After setting forth the needs and the invit- 
ing nature of the field, I closed my appeal thus: 

"I have been in the United States ten months. I have 
traveled thousands of miles and have attended the Anniver- 
saries in New York, four state conventions, many associa- 
tions and missionary meetings, and have, in behalf of the 
missionaries and native brethren, invited scores of pastors 
and ministerial students to come over and help us. But shall 
I write it? Only one has responded unreservedly to the 
Macedonian call. 

"I wish to return to Hindustan in September. Will four 
of you go before me, or go with me? You must, dear 
brethren. For how can I go back and tell those one hun- 
dred ministerial students that I can get no teachers for 
them? Can I tell the three thousand native Christians that 
their prayers are unheard — that of the twelve thousand 
Baptist preachers in America none will come to be their 
spiritual guides, and that they and their children must live 
on in ignorance? Must the multitudes of heathen under- 
stand that Christians believe that they will be eternally 
lost, but that none will come to warn and teach them? 
And must I say to those overworked faithful missionaries 
that — no, I cannot, I will not. The men are in the United 
States and will come. I believe it with all my heart. Please 
send on your names soon. We want to know who you are, 
and God and the Telugiis will bless you." 

The four men came. And they were men who proved 

themselves of unusual strength. In one of our conversa- 
tions, Dr. Warren said to me: "You know. Brother 



REENFORCEMENTS 219 

Clough, it takes faith to send out men. Out of every 
three whom we send, one falls sick, or to say the truth, 
gets homesick and soon returns; one hangs on year 
after year and does practically nothing; and the third. 
sticks and accomplishes what he is sent to do. In order 
to get this third man we are all at work." But this was 
not the case with the four men who came out to the 
Telugus that year. Elach one of them put in at least 
ten years of excellent service, and one of them remains 
to the present time. 

My search for men and money had an effect in several 
ways. It took me into the theological seminaries and 
I used my opportunity with the students. Even though 
they did not come, it made a difference to them after- 
wards as pastors. In traveling about, addressing 
churches, I was entertained in many homes. If I saw 
bright boys and girls, I told them to get a good educa- 
tion and then come to the Telugus. They never forgot it. 
It remained as a story told in that family circle, and 
made every member feel as if some personal obligation 
rested upon them. I established contacts between East 
and West in this way in great numbers. The Telugu 
Mission began to live in the homes of American people. 
Those boys and girls whom I invited were men and 
women when I came to America again. 

I became acquainted with many pastors of churches, 
especially in the Middle West. They seemed to give 
no thought to the burden I had laid upon the churches; 
all they wanted to know was what they could do to 
help. They said : "That work is of God." When I heard 
of some young pastor, marked for missionary zeal, I 
traveled miles out of my way to talk with that man. 
Some of them were heard from afterwards. One cold 
winter day I knocked at the door of a parsonage in 
Illinois. I asked the man who opened it, "Does the 



220 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Reverend Henry C. Mabie live here?" He replied, "I 
am the man." I said, "I have come to see whether I 
can get you to go to the Telugus with me." He smiled; 
for he knew me then. He said, "Come out of that snow 
into the house and we will talk it over." He was the 
nephew of Deacon Giles Mabie with whom I traveled 
over the prairie, long ago, when I was a colporter. He 
had heard his uncle talk about me ever since. I stayed 
in that parsonage two weeks. It is said that before I 
sailed for India I told the men at the mission rooms: 
"There is a fellow, named Mabie, out in Illinois. I 
want you to keep your eye on him and get him for the 
Telugus. I want him." He came afterwards, though 
not as a missionary, when twenty years had passed by, 
and a great change had come. 

I was invited to associations often, and was the one 
whom the pastors wanted to hear. They set aside those 
whom they always had with them, in order to listen to 
me. Missionaries were still few in those days. Asia 
was far away. My stories about the common every- 
day life of the Telugu people were wanted — the more 
unusual and unheard-of the better. At some associa- 
tion, after supper had been served in the church parlors, 
I was telling pastors and laymen about our preachers, 
how tirelessly they went from village to village. There 
was one drawback, however, that could cripple them, so 
that they could not walk for months. Now and then 
stagnant water by the roadside was infested with the 
Guinea worm, which fastens on the feet and burrows 
under the skin, working its way up to the knee. I was 
describing with graphic detail the crude way employed 
by the people, of winding the worm on a small stick, an 
inch a day, until its full length is removed. All were 
giving breathless attention. Dr. C. F. Tolman, one of 
our district secretaries in Chicago, sat there listening. 



REENFORCEMENTS 221 

Suddenly he broke in upon us : "There, I cannot go with 
you on that. I have traveled with you for months, and 
have stood by you, though you told some pretty tall 
stories. But I cannot go this one." There was a roar 
of laughter, and all of it against me. I had to subside. 

During that brief sojourn in America I turned the 
interest of many people to the Telugus, and I also made 
many personal friends. I wish I could speak of them all ; 
most of them have gone to the better land. My thoughts 
turn to Dr. A. H. Burlingham, at that time pastor in 
St. Louis, and a prominent figure in the denomination. 
He invited me to his home ; his church did nobly for the 
Telugus. When I came to America the second time he 
was district secretary for our society in New York. He 
was a man of tall, commanding personality. I felt it 
fitting to call myself his "Boy Friday" whenever I was in 
New York following calls here and there for public ad- 
dresses. Every morning I asked him what he wanted 
me to do, and played the role of "Boy Friday." The old 
doctor took this in very good humor, and retaliated by 
telling everyone that when I was in New York I was 
head of his office, and that he, for the time being, was a 
mere figurehead. 

As I came and went in Chicago I often saw Dr. Os- 
good, the man who, fourteen years before, brought me 
the call to my life's service. He had come to a beautiful 
old age, a benediction to all who came in contact with 
him. He followed me with a deep interest which was a 
source of spiritual strength to me. Then there was Dr. 
Warren, to whom my heart always went out. I was his 
man in a peculiar sense. Ill-health had come upon him. 
Our official relations had ceased. It made no difference 
to us. The allegiance I gave him remained the same. 
The spiritual support he gave me was unwavering. 

My mother's heart was satisfied by our presence so 



222 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

close to her. But she had to let me go back. Another 
ordeal was before her, My sister Vina was going to 
India as the wife of one of the new men. She was the 
one who had always stayed with mother, and cared for 
her. Mrs. Clough and I had aching hearts as we made 
arrangements to provide a home for our eldest son and 
daughter, who had to be left behind. In our family 
relations we were suffering deeply, but the cause was 
prospering. 

The denomination had now ceased to look upon the 
Telugu Mission as a "forlorn hope." By faith the men 
of those days had kept it alive. The call upon them now 
had been of a different order. They had risen to meet 
it. They gave all I asked. Had I asked more they would 
not have withheld it. They let me know in every way 
that "the brethren were with me." Once more it was 
like New Testament times, when the church at Jerusalem 
sent out men to convert the Gentiles to faith in Jesus 
Christ. We sailed from New York November 15, 1873. 



XIV 

MARKING MISSION BOUNDARIES 

With fresh vigor and determination we took up our 
work again in Ongole January 31, 1874. The Christians 
told us they had prayed for us every day while we were 
gone, as they had promised to do. They were full of joy, 
for they realized that an element of stability had now 
entered into the mission. With so much reenforcement 
the foundations of their new life seemed secure. The 
caste people were powerful, but so was our mission. They 
felt the Lord Jesus had done this for them. 

There had been a steady increase while I was gone. 
Dr. McLaurin had taken hold of the situation. My meth- 
ods, which he watched carefully when touring with me 
previous to my furlough, seemed right to him and he 
adhered to them. The staff of workers had become his 
loyal helpers, and he combined his zeal with theirs. 
Never afterward did he cease to love the old Ongole 
preachers. He had come in touch with the spiritual life 
in those men, and had learned to prize it. They con- 
tinued in their work just as before, with whole villages 
under instruction, people everywhere asking about the 
new religion. In the three northern taluks several 
preachers had been laboring abundantly. From that 
direction also the converts now pressed in. Calls came 
from all parts of the field for Dr. McLaurin's presence. 
He went on long tours. The result was that during the 

223 



224 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

two years of my absence he baptized more than one thou- 
sand. 

The increase then ceased. During two years after 
my return we received the people in tens ; there were no 
hundreds. Then the famine began, and it was under- 
stood that no one would be received. Thus when the 
ingathering came, with its nine thousand in six weeks, 
there had been four years of comparatively few acces- 
sions. There was a definite reason for this seeming 
standstill, so far as numbers were concerned. The move- 
ment, as it swept over the Madiga community, had picked 
up the best first — those who were ready to respond to 
the Christian appeal. The leaders had made the begin- 
ning. Then those followed who had been under their 
direct influence. Then came the wider circle of those 
with whom there were ties of family relationship. If it 
was within the memory of anyone that at some time a 
marriage had been contracted between two families, it 
constituted a claim. Tribal clannishness appeared in 
this form. Afterward when the old leaders were asked 
what their motive was for going to villages remote from 
Ongole, winning people over to the new religion, they 
generally replied that there was a family there, distantly 
related, which had to be told about the change that was 
coming over them all. Those related families again had 
branches of their own. The appeal, carried along with 
the impetus of clannish, tribal life, moved like an ava- 
lanche, gathering up as it went along. But a limit had 
now been reached. 

We had been at work seven years. Those of the Madi- 
gas who had been adherents of the Yogi Nasriah had 
mostly come over to us. We had absorbed the strength 
of that movement so far as it concerned the Madigas. 
Those who had belonged to the Ramanuja sect also had 
come. It was safe to say that all who had taken the 



MARKING MISSION BOUNDARIES 225 

first step out of the common village worship previous 
to our coming were with us by this time. They were at- 
tracted to the Christian religion and could not stay away. 
Many of those early members of our church had distinct 
religious experience back of them. They had taken one 
step after another, and knew why they had taken them. 
Then they had borne the first shock between the old life 
and the new. They had participated in a social uprising 
and had suffered in a cause. The village elders of those 
first years were afterward a host. The women had some- 
thing of strength about them that marked a number of 
them as Bible women. In later years the older Chris- 
tians felt a certain justifiable pride when they could say, 
*T joined the mission before the famine." 

This nucleus of three thousand Christians on the On- 
gole field was now hard at work among those who were 
still engaged in the worship of demons and serpents and 
female deities. They were bound to succeed, even though 
the response as yet was slight. There was less intelli- 
gence to work upon, less capacity for devotion, less re- 
ligious impulse. It took a catastrophe like the famine 
to rouse those Madigas of lesser standing out of the 
apathy of their lives. Then they rose up with all the 
gregariousness of their tribal characteristics and almost 
overwhelmed us. Yet they had been taught for years, 
taught faithfully. 

We missionaries of the Telugii Mission were now giv- 
ing much thought to the question of extending our field. 
We had four new men. We knew that our home con- 
stituency was ready to support us in marking our boun- 
daries on a somewhat ample plan. Our mission had at 
this time four stations, located along the seacoast. Our 
total membership in these four stations was nearly four 
thousand. 

Nellore had been a good base of operations. Dr. 



226 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Jewett had occupied this center for nearly thirty years. 
At this time, in 1874, he went on furlough, and gave 
charge of the work to Dr. David Downie, who has been 
the Nellore missionary since then. When Dr. and Mrs. 
Jewett returned to India in 1878 we all desired to see 
them settled in Madras, a large, important city. They 
opened the work for our Telugu Mission there, and left 
their benediction on it. 

During the three years while Dr. Jewett and I were 
alone in the Telugu Mission we decided that Ongole must 
be our second station. That move was evidently part of 
God's plan. Next we decided that we must occupy two 
centers lying between Nellore and Ongole. We fixed upon 
Allur as one of these, a town which had been one of the 
outstations of Nellore. Dr. Jewett in 1869 secured 
property for mission premises in Allur. There were 
members enough to organize a church. Helpers from 
Nellore felt called to Allur. Rev. Edwin Bullard, who 
came out in 1870, occupied this place for a time, but 
afterward did his main work in other stations of the 
mission. 

Mr. Timpany, who joined us in 1868, was the man 
for Ramapatnam, a place lying thirty miles south of 
Ongole. He looked for land on which to build a bunga- 
low, but none could be found. Then, during 1869, that 
most prosperous year of our early history, the govern- 
ment decided to transfer the headquarters of the English 
magistrate from Ramapatnam to Ongole. This made 
a large compound of nearly one hundred acres and two 
buildings available at low cost. Mr. Timpany wrote to 
me, "Is not the Lord making a broad road to Rama- 
patnam and its field?" Early in 1870 he settled there, 
and was now my nearest neighbor. Several of our help- 
ers joined him. Thirty-two members of our Ongole 
church, who lived on his field, united with the new 



MARKING MISSION BOUNDARIES 22*f 

church. I went to be present at its organization, and 
preached the sermon from I Samuel 2 130, "Them that 
honor me I will honor, and they that despise me shall 
be lightly esteemed." We all took a deep interest in the 
opening of this station. It has always been one of the 
strongest in the mission. 

Our theological seminary was located in Ramapatnam. 
Mr. Timpany had built up a flourishing school by the 
time I returned from America. He felt the need of it 
as keenly as I, for he, too, was receiving converts in 
large numbers and was wondering how to supply them 
with preachers. As he now gave charge of the seminary 
to Dr. R. R. Williams, we men on the field discussed 
the methods to be employed in this seminary from which 
we all expected so much. Several of us took it for 
granted that we were to have an institution after the 
pattern of theological schools in America, giving the 
men as complete a training as possible. Others, like 
myself, saw that we were facing an emergency, and that 
it would have to be our aim, at this juncture, to raise 
up a native ministry in the shortest time possible. I 
held that a course of two or three years would educate 
the men above their previous surroundings to a degree 
that would give them adequate fitness to be teachers and 
guides to the rest. I also insisted that the wives of the 
men should be given every opportunity to learn with 
their husbands. If they showed capacity equal to that 
of their husbands they were to be regarded as regular 
pupils in the seminary classes. I knew what a host one 
such woman could be out on the field. I also knew how 
crippled was the preacher whose wife was untrained. 

Dr. Williams was of my opinion. He reckoned with 
the needs which arose through the ingathering. During 
those pressing years there were two hundred students in 
the institution. The call for workers on the field was 



228 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

SO great that we felt bound to give opportunity for train- 
ing to every man who felt called to the service and stood 
above the average in intelligence. The seminary met a 
great need at that time. During all the years it has ful- 
filled the hopes I had concerning it. Gradually a better 
degree of fitness was required before entrance, and the 
course was extended to four years. 

My sister Vina, as the wife of Dr. Williams, was there 
during those formative years. She helped in teaching 
and directing the students, especially the women in the 
institution. She gave an abounding love and sympathy 
to all. Less than three years it lasted. Then Dr. Wil- 
liams and I stood by an open grave, under a palm tree, 
in sight of all the activities my sister loved so much. 
There we laid her body to rest. It was a stunning blow, 
against which I almost rebelled. But I told all who were 
mourning that the Lord Jesus makes no mistakes, but 
does all things well. Thus we have to step aside and 
bury our dead. Sometimes we never get over the feel- 
ing that something bright has been taken out of our 
lives which we could ill spare. But we move on and do 
our work. 

With our four stations along the seacoast, and a sem- 
inary located in one of them, we missionaries felt that 
we should do as Isaiah says, "Lengthen thy cords, and 
strengthen thy stakes; for thou shalt break forth on the 
right hand and on the left." We took into considera- 
tion the extent of the Telugu country. It covered a wide 
area and had a population of about eighteen million peo- 
ple. In the northern part of it was a city, Secunderabad, 
of fifty thousand inhabitants, and a large cantonment for 
English troops. A Telugu man from this city came to 
our mission to visit friends. He was a pensioned officer 
in a Sepoy regiment, an intelligent man, of noble bearing 
and simple piety. Years before when stationed in Burma 



MARKING MISSION BOUNDARIES 229 

he became connected with a church of our society there. 
We talked much with this man about Secunderabad. Rev. 
W, W. Campbell, one of our four new men, decided in 
December, 1874, to go to that distant city and ascertain, 
by looking over the field, whether Secunderabad was the 
center for us to occupy. He traveled by oxcart in slow 
stages, a distance of more than two hundred miles from 
Ongole, preaching everywhere. He came back convinced 
that that was the place for him, and accordingly made his 
application to the Executive Committee. His appoint- 
ment came, and with Mrs. Campbell he settled in Se- 
cunderabad. Eight men and women from the Ongole 
church went with him as helpers. They organized a 
church. A good foundation was laid; it became the 
base of several stations. Thus was our northern boun- 
dary marked. 

A year later we decided on our western boundary. 
My own intentions in this matter were overruled. I had 
fixed upon Cumbum and Markapur, sixty and eighty 
miles west of Ongole, as our outposts. The mountain 
range just beyond seemed to me to mark a natural boun- 
dary. Repeatedly I requested our Executive Committee 
to send a man to occupy Ongole, and let me settle out 
there. After our first ingathering, in 1869, ^ strong cen- 
ter of the movement was in that region. I wanted to be 
in the midst of it, but no one seemed to agree with me 
about this. Gradually I began to notice that what was 
called "the Ongole wave" was crossing that mountain 
range. It was penetrating to Kurnool, a city of twenty 
thousand inhabitants, where as yet no missionary was at 
work, one hundred and seventy miles west of us. 

There was "a man from Macedonia" calling to us to 
come and help. A priest, Galiah, living near Kurnool, 
heard of the Ongole Mission and the new religion. He 
felt he must go and learn more about it. He walked all 



230 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE 0RIE;^T 

the way, crossing the mountain range. He reached Cum- 
bum ; our school teacher there told him more about Jesus 
Christ. He walked on and on, till he came to us. I was 
deeply interested in the man, and believed he was a 
Christian. I advised him to go home and set his house 
in order and then come and join us. He was never heard 
from again. But he left his mark on me. Perhaps God 
sent him. Galiah told me with strong conviction that 
multitudes of his people would believe in the Lord Jesus 
if only they could hear of him. I wrote to America, May 
15, 1871: 

"Kurnool has been in my mind much since Galiah, the 
convert, went away. I think a missionary will have to go 
up there soon. You may think me visionary, but I cannot 
get rid of the thought — it haunts me night and day. I feel 
it more, I presume, because I have tried to keep our work 
on this side of the Nulla Mulla Hills, thinking that we 
finally could not go any further for years to come. If this 
work had been mine, I dare say I should have succeeded, 
but the work is God's and it goes where he pleases. I re- 
joice with trembling. O for help to be strong and to quit 
ourselves like men" 

Nearly five years had passed since then. I had not 
forgotten Galiah, the priest. I had sent Bezwada Paul 
and others beyond those mountains, and they had brought 
back reports that there were converts in that region. I 
talked with Rev. D. H. Drake, one of our new men, and 
we decided to go and spy out the land. If Mr. Drake and 
I had known how hard this tour was going to be, and 
how much it would cost him by way of ill-health, we 
might have hesitated. He often said afterward that it 
crippled his missionary career. Taken altogether, it was 
the most difficult tour of my missionary life and beset 
with many dangers. 



MARKING MISSION BOUNDARIES 23 1 

With an adequate equipment of tents and men we 
started November 15, 1875. The first sixty miles took us 
through a number of important centers where our Chris- 
tians lived. We preached to them everywhere and found 
them steadfast in faith, while many came, anxious to hear 
more about the Lord Jesus. Then we reached the foot 
of the Nulla Mulla Hills, a mountain range about 3,000 
feet high and from fifteen to twenty miles wide. We 
began our climb before daybreak, and went ten miles 
through dense jungle. We reached a good camping 
place, with a well close by. A number of idols had been 
placed here by pious Hindus, to guard the spot and keep 
away the demons that send malaria. We decided to pitch 
our small tent here and spend the night. Tigers were 
prowling around. Two of our men were awake all 
night keeping a large campfire burning to protect our 
ponies and bullocks and ourselves as well from tigers 
and panthers. Meanwhile I had sent Obulu with four of 
our men ahead to take the large tent across the mountain 
and pitch it ready for us when we arrived on the other 
side. A man of the wild Chentsu tribe, which inhabits 
those hills, served as guide. Four bearers with bamboo 
torches were to show the way. 

All went well with them until they came to a place 
where the road, just wide enough for a cart, wound 
round the side of a hill and up until it reached an eleva- 
tion of probably two thousand feet. On the one side 
was a mountain a thousand feet higher still, and on the 
other side an awful precipice, nearly perpendicular, a 
thousand feet down to the valley below. Here the bul- 
locks became frightened at something, and the cart top- 
pled over. A friendly tree, just in the right place, caught 
it, else the cart, my tent, bulls and cartmen would all have 
gone down the precipice. The men righted the cart, and 
then Obulu called to them, "Our God has delivered us 



232 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

from a horrible death. We must give him thanks.'* 
They took time to build a fire to keep off the tigers, and 
then they all bowed down with Obulu to pray. One after 
another they gave thanks. Even those hillmen, with 
incoherent words, acknowledged Obulu's God. There 
the next morning at eight I came upon them, as I was 
going ahead of the rest on my pony. I had to put fresh 
courage into Obulu and his little caravan before they 
were willing to go ahead. We all went together and 
reached the other side, thankful to be safe from tigers 
and jungle fever. 

Those tigers on our way gave us a good deal of anx- 
iety. The mountain pass was full of them, and some 
went prowling even in the day. We never knew at what 
moment a tiger might spring upon our bullock driver and 
carry him off. It happened on that road which we were 
traveling, that a man-eating tiger had learned to lie in 
wait for the mail-carrier, as he ran along, a stick over 
his shoulder, the mail-bag at one end and some bells 
jingling at the other, to frighten away the snakes on the 
road. For three days in succession he ate a mail-car- 
rier, and as it was known by telegram that no mail had 
arrived beyond the pass, all knew what it meant, and no 
native was willing to venture. An English officer de- 
cided to go and see what was wrong. He colored himself 
brown, tied on a loin cloth, took a gun on his shoulder 
with bells jingling on it, announcing his coming. He 
reached a place in dense jungle. A big tiger jumped out 
and was met by the gun. The Englishman looked about 
and saw three mail-bags with sticks and bells lying there 
and a few rags, giving evidence of the tiger's three meals. 
The great famine, several years later, thinned out those 
tigers. When the smaller animals began to starve be- 
cause everything had dried up, the tigers were the next 
to starve. They grew bold in going long distances, 



I 



MARKING MISSION BOUNDARIES 233 

prowling about the villages, adding to the terrors of the 
famine-stricken people. 

We rested on the other side of the pass and then moved 
on ten miles farther to the village Atmakur, where Bez- 
wada Paul had been at work, now and then, for more 
than a year. A deputation had come to Ongole from this 
village some months before and asked for a preacher. I 
had sent one, and had told him to tell the people I was 
coming to see them. We now went to their hamlet and 
found a congregation of two hundred ready to listen. 
Later in the day ten came to the tent and asked to be re- 
ceived, as they had believed in the Lord Jesus for some 
time. Then a number who had been undecided, though 
also under instruction, joined those ten. Mr. Drake and 
I stayed another day, and I preached again to a large con- 
gregation. We examined the converts, and saw no rea- 
son why they should not be received. My diary says : 

"We baptized twenty-six upon profession of faith in 
Jesus. At noon all assembled at the tent, and they chose 
four of their number as deacons, and Guraviah to be their 
pastor. Thus ended December i, 1875, in establishing the 
first Baptist church, or branch church, west of the moun- 
tains, to be connected with the future Kurnool Baptist 
Mission." 

The little company of believers begged for a missionary. 
They said hundreds would believe if they had some one 
there to teach them. This encouraged Mr. Drake. We 
had forty miles more to Kurnool, and when, just after 
sunrise, we entered the town, it presented a beautiful 
appearance, with the adjoining country, and the river 
flowing through. We called on the English officials, and 
looked about for a suitable bungalow for Mr. Drake. 

Our homeward journey from Kurnool nearly cost sev- 
eral lives. We took the southern pass. The first night 



L^ 



234 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

we went eight miles through the jungle and had to camp 
in a miasmatic place. The next day, when we halted 
after five miles more, Mr. Drake was taken with jungle 
fever. Two hours later our cook fell ill. I secured a 
cart for each and we pressed on, to get beyond the range 
of tigers and malaria. After we left the mountains be- 
hind us we had to go in easy stages because of our sick 
ones. Soon Obulu fell sick, and I hired a cart for him. 
Next a preacher, and two days later the tent pitcher fell 
sick. I now had a caravan of five sick men. The most 
serious case was that of Mr. Drake. At times I won- 
dered whether he would live. I had ample medicine with 
me for them all. But nine days of tedious journey lay 
between Ongole and the place where they fell sick. When 
at last we reached Ongole we had traveled over more 
than four hundred miles on horseback, or in carts, or on 
foot. 

Six months later Mr. Drake settled in Kurnool. I 
called for volunteers among our preachers to go with 
him, and took from them a promise that they would not 
fail him in that distant city. The little center at Atma- 
kur, which we had planted, throve well for a time. Later 
there was some falling away. During the years of the 
great ingathering hundreds professed faith in Jesus. 
There was a harvest in that direction, just as Galiah, the 
priest, told me seven years before would be the case. 

Thus were the northern and western boundaries of our 
Telugu Mission staked during 1875. For twenty years 
we kept our work within the lines then marked. Later 
the younger men went somewhat farther, but practically 
the outposts remained the same. 

An important move of those years was the founding 
of the Canadian Baptist Telugu Mission north of us. 
The work among the Telugus had a strong hold upon the 
Baptists in Canada. Mr, Day, the founder of our Telugu 



MARKING MISSION BOUNDARIES 235 

Mission, had passed the last eighteen years of his Hfe at 
home in Canada. Like a prophet of old, he said at the 
last, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace 
according to thy word, for mine eyes have seen thy sal- 
vation." He wrote to Dr. Jewett, a few months before 
his death, in 1871 : "Oh how many times within a few 
years, when reading missionary news from our Telugu 
Mission, I have almost staggered under the weight of 
the good news, and like the disciples on one occasion after 
the resurrection of their Lord, 'believed not for joy and 
wondered.' " He did not live to hear of the thousands 
who had come. The hundreds stood as a fulfillment 
granted by God to this man of faith. 

The interest aroused in Canada by the work of the 
Timpanys and McLaurins had led to large giving. It 
was decided to begin an independent work among the 
Telugus by opening a station at Cocanada, an important 
seaport town about two hundred miles northeast of On- 
gole. Accordingly, when I returned to India in 1874, 
Dr. and Mrs. McLaurin resigned their connection with 
our society and began work in Cocanada. They were 
soon joined by other men and women from Canada. In 
1878 Mr. and Mrs. Timpany also united with this new 
mission, leaving behind, on the Ramapatnam field, a 
strong membership of nearly eight hundred. Much fra- 
ternal interest has always characterized the relations be* 
tween the Canadian Mission and our own. 

There is a half-circle of Baptist missions along the 
coast of the Bay of Bengal, extending over three thou- 
sand miles. These missions are at work among people 
of various origin, speaking various languages. One 
after another, in the course of the century, they came 
from England, the United States, Canada and Australia, 
clustering side by side in a neighborly way. Dr. William 
Carey made the beginning in 1793, founding a large 



236 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

English Baptist mission in and beyond Calcutta. This 
formed the middle of the half -circle. Dr. Adoniram 
Judson, after calling upon American Baptists to form a 
society, began in 18 13 in Burma, and the work extended 
into Assam. Dr. Judson was at one end of the half- 
circle. Our Telugu Mission was at the other end of it. 
He began in 18 13, while our expansive period began 
fifty years later, in 1864. 

That half-circle of Baptist missions stands for much 
hard work and much faith. Innumerable strands of in- 
fluence reach out to connect the men of India with Chris- 
tian men of several continents. The divine life of Jesus 
Christ finds expression in this connection. Men looked 
to him and did their work in his name. 



XV 

AN INDIAN FAMINE 

The half-yearly monsoon, In the summer of 1876, had 
failed. We all were anxiously watching the clouds. If 
another monsoon season passed with cloudless sky a fam- 
ine was inevitable. 

In September of that year I went on tour. I wanted 
especially to go into the Kanigiri and Podili taluks to see 
the Christians; for I had heard that they were suffering 
through the scarcity which had already begun. Periah, as 
arranged, met me when I reached those taluks. He told 
me I could go no farther. He said my horse which I 
was riding, and the bullocks drawing the cart with my 
tent must starve if I proceeded further, which meant 
that I would have no means of returning home. I re- 
fused to believe that the outlook was already so dark. I 
tried all day to get straw to take along as fodder, but 
had to give it up. I was on the confines of the area 
where distress was already evident. Very reluctantly I 
turned and went back home. My heart was heavy with 
the trouble which I saw was coming. 

The poor, dumb beasts were the first to suffer. Fod- 
der had given out. Cattle were fed on the leaves of trees 
and shrubs, made eatable by soaking and pounding. Even 
that supply was exhausted. Out in the jungle the rab- 
bits and deer died out. Tigers roamed about hungry. 
Jackals alone were thriving, for they fed on the dead. 

237 



238 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

The Nellore district was famous for its breed of cat- 
tle. The government occasionally instituted cattle shows. 
I always took an interest in these efforts to increase the 
prosperity of the community. The Sudras began now 
to feel hard pressed. The beautiful cattle, which were 
their pride, and stood for their wealth, were starving. 
Dealers from all parts of India w^ere coming to buy up 
the best. They were unscrupulous, and offered a beg- 
garly price. The Sudras appealed to me. I stepped in 
for them as go-between. I was a farmer's son, and 
knew the value of cattle. I helped a few, and the report 
of it spread. Soon the Sudras refused to sell, except 
through me. The dealers began to come straight to me. 
I could not spare the time to conduct small sales. They 
brought the cattle to me in droves. A sale of one hun- 
dred cows in one day was the highest I reached. I al- 
ways arranged for a fair price. The governor in Ma- 
dras heard of it and twice sent me a large order to fill 
for his household. Soon all the cattle were gone. Only 
the wealthiest Sudras could keep a few and feed them 
somehow. It took the prosperous farming community 
years to rise from the calamity which fell upon them at 
the beginning of the famine. 

The Madigas, being on the bottom round of the lad- 
der, were the next to suffer the pangs of hunger. Even 
when harvests were good they were never far from the 
condition where they had only one meal a day. For a 
time they fed on the cattle that died of starvation. Then 
distress began. Our Christians complained bitterly that 
they had a meal only once in two days and could not 
endure it much longer. Soon the preachers and helpers, 
of whom there were now sixty, wrote urgent letters to 
me. They had nothing to eat. The church members 
were themselves starving, and could not give them so 
much as a handful of rice. The willingness of the people 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 239 

to provide for their preachers and teachers suffered a 
shock. They never wholly returned to their old habits 
of giving. 

While we men of the white race were slowly becoming 
convinced that something on a large scale would have to 
be undertaken to relieve the growing distress, the Hindus 
were at work giving help in their own way. Families 
who had enough to eat went on half rations, in order to 
give to relatives who were starving. Wealthy men of 
every caste obeyed their sacred books, and fed a given 
number of people each day. Some fed only a few ; some 
several hundred ; there were Hindu gentlemen in Madras 
who fed two thousand each day. Even if only a little 
thin gruel was given, it sustained life. All through the 
famine the charity of the Hindus was in evidence. They 
joined us white men when the government now made an 
organized effort, backed by large expenditure from its 
treasury. There was blending here of Western and 
Eastern modes of charity. White men were familiar 
with organized efforts. The Hindus found that in this 
way also they could feed the poor and fulfill thereby the 
law of their religion. 

The government of the Madras Presidency began in a 
masterly fashion to cope with the situation. Public 
works on a gigantic scale, which had been contemplated 
for years, were now undertaken in order to give employ- 
ment to the starving. The construction of the Bucking- 
ham Canal was one of these and concerned us in our dis- 
trict. Thus far it had extended from Madras north 
about one hundred miles, and came to a stop a little be- 
yond Nellore. The question had often been raised of 
extending the canal a hundred miles further. We had 
nothing north of Nellore but country roads, and they 
were impassable sometimes for weeks, during the rainy 
season. Engineers came and computed that it would 



240 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

take four years to do the digging, which meant heavy- 
expenditure. I pointed out in the Madras papers even 
before anyone thought of a famine, that those engineers 
had overestimated both the time and the money required 
for the canal project. It now came to pass that under 
stress of famine the one hundred miles of canal were 
completed in one year's time. 

A leading government engineer, who had had experi- 
ence in employing large bodies of working people, was 
instructed to have the whole program of operations ready. 
There was still hope that the usual northeast monsoon 
would come at the end of 1876, and that a famine would 
thereby be averted. It failed. Then the order was given. 
In three weeks' time officials were in their places, and 
one hundred thousand people were at work digging. The 
management of the whole project was admirable. Every- 
where the motive to give relief was apparent. It was all 
on a humane basis. 

I watched the work on the Buckingham Canal with 
keen interest. The line taken passed through the region 
where our Christians lived. They could thus be saved 
from starvation. I wanted to help them. It was clear 
to me that I must work in conjunction with government 
officials. I lost no time in offering my services to them. 
Everything they did was on a large scale. They had 
eight thousand tons of rice from Burma to transport in 
the direction of Cumbum, and asked me to contract for 
the necessary bullock carts. Cholera broke out in On- 
gole. It was prevalent in the district also. They gave 
me ten thousand cholera pills to distribute among our 
preachers, on condition that I would teach them how to 
help the sufferers. 

The groups of people sitting on my veranda and under 
the trees in front of it gave evidence of the growing dis- 
tress. They were from every part of my field, already 



i 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 24I 

emaciated and asking me to help them. The preachers 
and teachers were coming and going with care-worn 
faces. Some friends, government officials among them, 
had placed money at my disposal to give to starving 
Christians. It was as nothing compared with what was 
even then required. I began to advise the able-bodied 
who came for help to go to the canal and dig; for the 
work on it was now approaching nearer. But I saw that 
I could not induce them to go there in numbers unless I 
was there myself. It was a question of the old disability 
of the Madigas. In principle the English officials al- 
lowed no distinctions to be made. When it came to prac- 
tice, the overseers, who were closest to the people, had 
scope to oppress them and illtreat them. The Madigas 
preferred to die at home in their own hamlets. 

I talked with the preachers. They had taken counsel 
with the village elders everywhere and knew the mind 
of the people. I saw that public opinion in our Christian 
community had taken hold of the question. The preach- 
ers acted as spokesmen for the people. They stood be- 
tween me and the thousands whom I was anxious to keep 
alive, and intimated to me how it would have to be done. 
I was to create an opportunity for the Christians, and 
give them backing and protection. The preachers were 
ready to second my efforts. They pointed out to me 
that several of their number had at times been placed 
over gangs of coolies in road-making and other con- 
tracts. With these men as overseers the Christians would 
have no fears. The conviction grew upon me that I 
must personally take an active part in the hard work of 
that canal if I wanted to see our Christians get any 
benefit from it. 

I decided to make a definite move. I went first to 
Kottapatam, a seaport town ten miles east of Ongole, 
where the engineers of that section of the canal had their 



242 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

headquarters. I showed those engineers my certificate 
as United States Deputy Surveyor, given to me twenty 
years before in the wilds of Minnesota. It served as my 
card of admission. They saw at once that I w^as ac- 
quainted with the technical terms of surveying and could 
talk that language. I somehow fell right into line. To 
make a beginning I took a contract for one mile. My 
camp was to be located at Razupallem, a few miles south 
of Kottapatam. I sent my tent and my whole camping 
outfit to this place February 5, 1877, and here now I 
practically lived for four months. 

Mrs. Clough, meanwhile, was in charge of our com- 
pound in Ongole. She bore a heavy load during those 
months. Cholera was always threatening. Regular mis- 
sion work was disorganized. She had to help everyone 
make the best of the situation. A coolie was sent to me 
each day with water and supplies and my mail. I was 
kept in touch with all that was going on. Without this 
efficient cooperation we could not have carried the bur- 
dens of those days. 

When the preachers saw that my tent now marked the 
place which was to be our camp, near Razupallem, they 
took courage, and were eager to do their part. I chose 
Thaluri Daniel, on account of his practical ability, to be 
at the head of the village of huts which had to be erected. 
I showed him the site, and how to lay out the one hun- 
dred huts in rows, forming little streets similar to camps 
along the whole line of the canal. The engineers fur- 
nished us with palm leaves and sticks for the huts. Sev- 
eral wells had to be dug. Potters had to bring a supply 
of pots for cooking. Native merchants were to come 
with bags of grain and set up a bazaar. I sent for mill- 
stones to grind the grain. Thus we made ready for that 
which was to come. 

I went back to Ongole. Our preachers, meanwhile, 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 243 

had gone out to tell the Christians everywhere about our 
camp. At a given time they were to come with com- 
panies from their fields. Wayside allowance had been 
granted for them, that they might not succumb on the 
way. An emaciated crowd of hundreds of our Chris- 
tians arrived in our compound. I gave them food and 
sent them to our camp, and mounted my horse in order 
to arrive there before them. It was a night of great 
confusion as they took possession of huts and clamored 
for food. The preachers and I were hard pressed, but 
finally order prevailed. We were dealing with hungry 
people. 

The work of digging began February 24, 1877. I 
took a spade and did the first stroke of work myself. 
We were supplied with picks and shovels. The men 
worked with these; the women filled baskets with earth 
and carried them away on their heads to empty on one 
side and return. The canal was to be twelve feet deep. 
We had about eight hundred coolies on our list. Every- 
thing seemed now in good order for work, then cholera 
broke out. My diary records : 

"March 17, 1877: Ten new cases of cholera. Prospect 
bad. 

"March 18: Trying all day to keep down a panic. Sev- 
eral new cases of cholera. 

"March 20 : Cholera thicker. Conclude not to send any 
more to Kottapatam hospital. The people beg not to be 
sent. Wrote to Dr. O'Hara and ask for a hospital here and 
a dresser. Out in the sun before the little cholera huts from 
early morning till noon giving medicines. Seven were down 
with cholera. One man was much frightened. He com- 
plained the liniment I put on him burnt him, and he re- 
fused the medicine. In another hut was a friend of this 
man, who shouted to him between his cramps and pains: 
'Take the medicine! Stop groaning that way! Trust in 



244 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Jesus. Pray to Jesus. Do not be a coward.' He offered 
a silent prayer before he took a dose of medicine, and re- 
covered. The other man died." 



I began now to suspect the food the people were eat- 
ing. I told the preachers to watch. They found the 
native merchants were bringing grain into the camp that 
was spoiled or only half ripe. It was cheap and the peo- 
ple bought it. This was contrary to my agreement with 
those merchants. I came upon two of them bringing 
spoiled grain into our bazaar. They dropped their bags 
in fear and ran when they saw me. The grain fell upon 
the ground and I stamped it with my feet till it was 
mixed with sand and no one could find and eat it. After 
that one of the preachers was in charge of the bazaar of 
the camp. 

We found also that we would have to give special care 
to the new arrivals. The people came in groups, large or 
small, all in a starving condition. One of our older 
preachers, a man with a kind heart, was there and re- 
ceived them; he gave them something to eat and told 
them to rest. Often they were too hungry to wait; they 
ate the half -boiled grain out of the pot, and then lay down 
and died. If the preacher tried to make those who were 
weak drink gruel until they could bear a substantial meal 
they refused. It angered them. They said, "Never 
mind, let me eat ; I am dying with hunger." Others were 
so emaciated, no matter how much they ate, they were 
always hungry. They ate oftener and more than their 
starved bodies could endure. Soon they were found 
lying somewhere very still, and those who looked at 
them found that they were dead. 

The people saw that the preachers and I were caring 
for their needs, yet though we did everything in our 
power to put courage into them, a panic spread. They 



1 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 245 

said, "If we must die, let us go home and die there." 
Soon half the coolies on my list were either sick or dead, 
or had quietly, without saying anything, left for their 
homes. Only a few hundred remained. But I was now 
given a hospital for my camp. A dresser came and I 
gave him medical charge. Then I went home to Ongole, 
for I was worn out and not well. 

Scarcely had I been at home a few days, resting while 
I attended to all the accumulation of work awaiting me 
there, when new distress sent me back to the canal. It 
began to rain heavily one afternoon, and continued the 
next day. I wondered how they were faring at the camp. 
As I listened during the night to the downpour I was glad 
only a few hundred coolies were left; for I knew the 
preachers could care for them till I could reach them. 
At sunrise I was on my horse. It had stopped raining. 
The Yellagundla River had come down between me and 
camp, one and a half miles wide, and from six inches to 
two feet deep. I had to cross this. When halfway 
across my horse gave out. Then I took to wading. The 
faithful men at camp were on the lookout for me. They 
came in a body to meet me. They offered to carry me 
the rest of the stretch through the water. It was so 
muddy I feared they could not — I walked. When I 
reached my tent I had been in wet clothes three hours, 
with the hot sun overhead. I wrote immediately to Ma- 
jor Chambers and reported the distress of my coolies, and 
he replied I might give subsistence allowance. 

Thus the rain came for which we longed so much, but 
it came in torrents. We tided over the hardships that 
came through the cold dampness and were thankful ; for 
the rain had kept off a water famine — one terror less. 

Large companies of coolies were coming now to the 
camp. Those who had gone home panic-stricken re- 
turned and brought others with them. Several preachers 



246 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

were going about everywhere over the field telling the 
people to come to the camp and dig and live. Wayside 
allowance was provided that they might not starve walk- 
ing the weary miles to the canal. I knew that I must 
count upon a large increase in coolies in a short time. I 
therefore applied for a contract for three and a half 
miles, including the previous smaller contract. 

My one thought was to keep the Christians and the 
adherents alive. But the reply to my application opened 
a different way to me. Lieut. Rawson, R. E., wrote to 
me March 20, 1877 : 

'*1 am very sorry indeed that you have cholera in your 
coolie camp. I hope that it will soon be better. I am per- 
fectly willing to let you have from B. M. stone no to B. M. 
stone 136 on the condition that you mention that, if your 
own Christian coolies cannot finish the contract, you will 
get in other people to help them." 

I agreed to that condition about letting other coolies 
help on my contract if my Christian coolies could not 
finish it. I had no expectation that this contingency 
would arise. In the beginning my camp was emphati- 
cally a Christian coolie camp. Then the engineer in 
charge asked me to put on a larger force, and the num- 
bers rose to over three thousand, only about half of whom 
were Christians. The other half here came under Chris- 
tian instruction to which circumstances gave a peculiar 
force. 

One preacher after another was now made overseer. 
They showed each other how to do the measuring and 
how to keep accounts. In order to produce a fellow- 
feeling between the overseers and the coolies I made it 
a rule that every man who applied for the post must first 
work among the diggers until blisters rose on his hands. 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 247 

The men enjoyed it. They came and showed me their 
hands with every indication that they had been using 
pick and shovel. I said, "You will make good over- 
seers." They went to work with a smile on their faces. 
The people knew that this had been done. It made a dif- 
ference with them all. The preachers saw my meaning. 
It was a case of being all things to all men. 

Each overseer was responsible for one hundred coolies. 
He had to calculate the amount of work done, and pay 
for it at sundown. With measuring rod in his hand, he 
was always there, and became acquainted with those 
under him. Wages were good; men saved up a few 
rupees, went home and sent other members of their fam- 
ilies. Our preachers were now all at our camp. Their 
influence over the field was dominant, perhaps more than 
ever. The members of their flock came straight to them 
when they reached the canal. They brought tidings from 
the field. Messages were sent by those who returned 
home. The village elders especially formed a connecting 
link; many of them came to the canal, others stayed at 
home. They cooperated with the preachers. All took 
an interest in the hundreds and thousands who were now 
coming, who were not yet members of our Christian com- 
munity. They were treated with all kindness by the 
preachers, and were made to lose their fear and to feel 
at ease. 

Those leaders of the movement among the Madigas 
who had been at the head of the social uprising among 
them stood now, at intervals, along our three miles of 
canal. There were times when their number rose to 
thirty. The best among them struck the keynote. The 
rest followed. They were holding together with all the 
sense of fellowship that had already endured for many 
years. Related to one another and to many of those 
who came by family ties, the sorrows of the people were 



248 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN fHE ORIENT 

their own. They stood now in the hot sun, day after 
day, with no shade overhead. When a group of diggers 
sat down for a short rest they sat with them. They lis- 
tened to stories about scattered families, and about those 
who had died. There was always the wail, "We are all 
dying." Out of their own sorrow they spoke comforting 
words. Not one of them had escaped affliction. Cholera 
had been abroad for some time. No one was safe. The 
wife of a preacher, going with him to the camp, lay down 
by the roadside, stricken, and died. Others in the camp 
were as sad as he. The roadsides in all that region were 
lined with the bleaching bones of those who could not go 
further. The preachers said afterward, "Our hearts 
were very heavy, and our Dhora's hair turned white 
during that year." 

The name of Jesus was spoken all day long from one 
end of our line to the other. The preachers carried a« 
New Testament in their pockets. It comforted the peo- 
ple to see the holy book of the Christians amid all their 
distress. They said, when they sat down for a shorf 
rest, "Read us again out of your holy book about the 
weary and heavy-laden." That verse, "Come unto me, 
all ye that labor" — was often all I had to give the people 
by way of comfort. The preachers were saying it all 
day long. It carried us through the famine. It was the 
verse of the ingathering. We all needed it ; for even the 
strongest among us sometimes felt their courage sinking. 

Thousands of Madigas were coming and going who 
had often heard about our Master, Jesus, but had put off 
hearing more. Thus far they had wanted above all 
things the favor of the caste people in whose service they 
were; they had faithfully worshiped the village gods. 
They came now to our camp, their minds filled with 
dread of the demons and fiends whom they had always 
tried to appease, but who, they thought, were now let 



i 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 249 

loose to slay the living. The preachers talked to them 
about Jesus Christ. They described to them how he 
healed the sick ; how he loved little children ; how he fed 
a multitude of people, lest they grow hungry on their 
way home. Those stories of Jesus sank into the minds 
of the listeners till they forgot about the demons. They 
began to think about Jesus and went home and found 
they believed in him. 

It was Christianity applied in practice on our portion 
of the canal. The weakest were cared for most. There 
were children who had survived their parents, and were 
given protection. There were women without husband 
or brother, who were yet safe in our camp. Those who 
were too weak to work were given food just the same. 
All were treated well — yet they were Madigas. They 
would have hesitated to go to any other camp. The caste 
man could deny himself, and give half his meal to a 
starving man of his own caste. He would feel less wil- 
lingness to help the Pariah. Now the caste people of all 
that region took notice. They watched my attitude. My 
tent was a little to one side of the village of huts. It 
served as anchorage to the camp. The preachers had 
access to me at all times. The coolies took courage be- 
cause I was there to look out for them. The English 
officials often made it a halting place, as they passed that 
way on horseback, inspecting the work. They took tea 
with me, and stayed for a chat. They treated me as one 
of themselves, and I appreciated it. They were a fine 
type of Englishmen. The caste people decided that 
though "the Ongole Dhora had made a big Madiga of 
himself," he had not thereby lost caste with the men of 
the ruling race, since they came and ate with him. The 
social status of the Madigas was rising. The contact 
between West and East here shed light upon the Chris- 
tian sense of the brotherhood of man. 



250 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

March passed, and with April the hot season of the 
year began. I buih a large shed over my tent, with a 
thick covering of palm leaves, to escape the danger of a 
sunstroke during the middle of the day. There was no 
help for the people. Heat was not dangerous to them, 
but they suffered under it. Then a calamity came upon 
us. My diary says : 

*'May 17, 1877 : About eight in the evening very heavy 
rain commenced — evidently a cyclone. It rained fearfully 
all night. I took my tent full of old people and women 
with babies. I gave them Pain Killer and covered them 
up with common blankets, which I had on hand, to keep 
them from perishing with cold. At noon the rain ceased. 
By 3 o'clock two rivers came down in force and ran three 
or four feet deep over all my pits. At midnight the water 
had come to the west palm leaf shed over my tent, and was 
one and a half miles wide. Many of the huts were flooded 
and I expected my tent would be." 

All this was hard to bear. For days all was wet and 
soaking, while the water was slowly receding. The 
emaciated bodies of the coolies were not fit to bear this 
cold dampness, while the hot rays of the sun beat upon 
them, with no shade over their heads. At night they 
huddled together, their teeth chattering, wondering when 
it would be their turn to die. I had to keep up my own 
courage by continually telling them that the Lord Jesus 
makes no mistakes, that it must be all right in some way. 
And so we worked on. 

The hot winds came. They were terrible that year, 
and threatened to close the earthly career of us white 
men who had thus far held to our posts without flinching. 
The thermometer was at 1 10 degrees at midnight. The 
European officers in tents and huts along the canal were 
falling victims to this heat ; four died of sunstroke in a 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 25 1 

few days ; others lay very ill from partial sunstroke ; the 
higher officials were ordered away. The preachers grew 
alarmed for my safety. They said, "If you, too, were to 
die or fall sick, what good would it do to anyone ? What 
could we do without you, with the famine still on us? 
Go back to Ongole to the bungalow. We will stay and 
carry on everything as if you were here. If we get into 
some great trouble you will still be near enough to help 
us." 

I saw that they were right. It was time for me to 
withdraw. I knew the sub-engineer of that part of the 
canal. The preachers were willing to work under his 
supervision. I gave my contract over to him and re- 
turned to Ongole. The work continued several months 
longer. I was in touch with all that was happening at 
the camp, helping several times when an emergency arose. 
The whole stretch of more than one hundred miles of 
canal was completed in August, 1877. Afterward the 
chief engineer of our section of thirty-five miles took oc- 
casion to write to me : "I am glad to say that your por- 
tion of the canal is the best on the whole line. It is so 
uniform, and cut to proper depth without ups and downs 
as everywhere else." 

I saw from the Madras papers that the government 
was instituting relief work on a large scale here and 
there in the famine area. I was anxiously hoping that 
something of the kind would be opened in our part of 
the country. I knew the executive engineer, J. O'Shaugh- 
nessy, Esq., who carried the Buckingham Canal project 
through with admirable skill. I wrote to him about a 
scheme for irrigation on a large scale. Many a time, 
during the previous years, when I was fording the rivers 
north and south of Ongole, I thought that all this water 
ought to be utilized. I pointed out possible ways and 



252 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

means to Mr. O'Shaughnessy. This was his reply, dated 
August 6, 1877 : 

**I have often thought that all the rivers in the notth, 
the Munnair, the Palair, the Moosee, and the Gundlacumma, 
could be turned to most useful account, but I have not had 
a moment to spare for investigating what should be done. 
Some day, no doubt, these rivers will be taken up. The 
quantity of water that escapes by them to the sea, year 
after year, or even month after month, is enormous, while, 
as you know, the people through whose lands it goes away 
to waste would give their lives almost to be able to store 
it for their use. I sent an extract from one of your letters 
to the government and I have been informed that the letter 
I sent with it, as well as the extract itself, have been sent to 
the secretary of state. There is a compliment to you, and 
through you to me. Let's hope some good will come of it." 

But nothing came of it. The scheme was considered 
too expensive. Down to the present time all that water 
flows into the sea. Engineers are sometimes sent to in- 
vestigate. They hand in their reports and by reason of 
expense the project falls through. It is a pity that it was 
not taken up at that time. Large sums of money were 
expended in operations of that kind: roads were made, 
artificial lakes were dug, railroads constructed, and many 
thousands were thus helped. It was the better way; for 
there is a difference between giving a man the money he 
has earned and putting into his hand the dole of charity. 
The saving of the self-respect of the people was an object 
in itself. 

We had now gone through six months of famine, pre- 
ceded by six months of scarcity. Twice the half-yearly 
monsoon season had passed with cloudless sky. When 
the cyclone came in May, bringing floods of water, the 
grass sprang up. Much grain was sown, but the long- 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 253 

continued hot winds withered and dried up everything. 
From June to August was the season for the southwest 
monsoon. Millions were praying for rain. The Hindus 
prayed to the gods of the land. The Mohammedans be- 
sought Allah. We of the Christian religion begged our 
God to send rain. The time passed. No rain came. 
We all knew that now it had become a case of hand-to- 
hand fight with death. 

The government of the Madras Presidency already had 
on its relief works nearly a million people, and another 
million was fed gratuitously in relief camps. In the 
Bombay Presidency, and in the native states, relief on 
the same scale was going on. Yet, great as these figures 
of those obtaining relief may seem, they were small com- 
pared to the forty million people who were living in the 
famine area, eighteen million of them in the Telugu 
country. Large quantities of grain continued to be 
brought into the country by the government. An in- 
creasing number of people had not the money with 
which to buy. An organized effort had to be made to 
bring money into India and into the hands of those who 
needed it in order to sustain life. Englishmen rose to 
the emergency. In August, 1877, a meeting of promi- 
nent citizens in Madras was called. The governor pre- 
sided. A resolution was adopted to cable to the lord 
mayor of London, and to the mayors of several other 
large cities in the British Isles, requesting immediate aid, 
as distress was great. This resulted in the Mansion 
House Fund — a great public charity, which still stands 
almost unequaled. For nine months money from Eng- 
land and the colonies came pouring into India. 

When those Englishmen appealed to their mother 
country for help, my American patriotism rose up within 
me. I remembered the golden corn of Iowa and Illinois. 
If only we had some of that in starving India! J could 



254 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

not keep quiet about this. I knew the secretary of the 
board of revenue in Madras, and wrote to him about 
that abundance in America which could so easily over- 
flow into India. I told him about American farmers in 
some states who were using Indian corn for fuel because 
it was cheaper than coal. I suggested a cable to Presi- 
dent Hayes and to the governors of the great corn-grow- 
ing states. I said : "I know America and Americans 
well. It is not their nature to do things on a small scale. 
They have so much money that thousands of them do not 
know what to do with it. To give it to India now in this 
awful calamity would not only do us good, but them 
also." 

This letter was inserted in a leading Madras daily 
paper. There was a long editorial about it. In those 
years the nations were beginning to stand by each other 
in times of calamity. England had shown a splendid 
helpfulness at the time when a terrible fire leveled a great 
portion of Chicago to the ground. The editor did not 
doubt that Americans would be swift to return this 
good will to England's dependency. But there was no 
way of making connection. America as yet had few 
points of contact with India. Spontaneous gifts there- 
fore were few. As for an appeal to American high offi- 
cials, there was no one, either individually or collectively, 
competent to urge this without thereby being guilty of 
discourtesy to the supreme government. It could not be 
done at that time. All that I longed for came to pass in 
1900 when famine was again afflicting India. Dr. Louis 
Klopsch, of the Christian Herald, of New York, created 
a channel by which American money was sent to India in 
large amounts. Ships laden with American corn came 
into Bombay harbor. I had some of it in Ongole and dis- 
tributed many bagsful among the hungry. International 
helpfulness had grown. 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 255 

Some weeks passed before the "Mansion House Fund" 
was in full operation. It was hard to wait for the relief 
it brought. My diary tells of times when I sat up till 
midnight after a hard day's work, writing letters with 
appeals, and how I rose at four in the morning to get in 
some hours of writing before the people woke up and 
began to besiege me. I wrote to friends in America and 
in England. I appealed to the missions of our society 
in Burma and Assam. They had no famine there. The 
Karen Christians in Burma began to deny themselves in 
order to send help to their starving brethren on our side 
of the Bay of Bengal, when they heard of my telegram, 
"Thousands Christians starving, please solicit subscrip- 
tions.'' The several thousand rupees they sent helped to 
tide us over the time till something could be done on a 
larger scale. 

Starving men and women were dragging themselves 
into our compound wailing for help. Sometimes they 
lay down for rest when they had reached our gate and 
never got up again. I was on my feet from morning 
till night trying at least to give a hearing to those who 
had come for help, and paying out the small amounts 
which friends were putting into my hands to those who 
needed help most. When I told them I had nothing more 
to give they found it hard to believe me. I was to many 
their last hope. Almost every day caste people came, 
walking many miles, to ask me to buy their jewelry. It 
was the custom for families to put their savings into 
their jewels. As the native dealers would not give a fair 
price, the people begged me to buy, and at least to help 
them thus. Otherwise all they had would buy food only 
for a few days. It was hard to witness the distress. 

Again we were approaching the monsoon season. This 
time we did not wait in vain. In October, 1877, rain 
came. It was an abundant monsoon. The government 



km 



256 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

distributed seed grain. Everyone, no matter how small 
his plot of ground, came in for his share — so much per 
acre. Bullocks and buffaloes were gone; men hitched 
themselves to the plow. Some had sold their plow, a 
crude implement of wood; it had bought a few meals. 
They now took crooked branches to make the furrows 
and carefully, with mantras, they dropped in the seed. 
It rotted in the ground. The fields were sown a second, 
a third, and in some cases a fourth time. At last the 
crops looked promising, and a sense of relief came over 
us all. Then grasshoppers came in great numbers. Some 
fields were wholly destroyed by them; many were so 
badly injured that not more than one- fourth of a crop 
could be expected. Those weeks were hard .to bear. 
The fluctuating between hope and despair tried even the 
strongest and bravest among us. 

The supposition is that the famine cost more than three 
million lives. It would have cost many million more but 
for the Mansion House Fund, and the Englishmen in 
Madras, who perfected in the shortest possible time a 
gigantic organization for the distribution of the money. 
William Digby, Esq., editor of the Madras Times, was 
from the beginning a leading spirit in the enterprise. 
He now served as honorary secretary. An Executive 
Famine Relief Committee was formed in Madras on 
which twenty-five leading gentlemen of Madras served. 
Many of them were business men who gave up their noon 
hours to the careful arrangement of the large financial 
transactions. Leading Hindus and Mohammedans, who 
were men of affairs, were on this committee. The wealth 
of India became apparent in princely donations which 
came especially from several rajahs. The money was 
not by any means the gift of the white race only. Nor 
was it a charity conducted on a large scale by Protestant 
Christianity. The Roman Catholic Church was in every 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 257 

way represented. It was a scheme that was all-inclusive. 
Men forgot their differences of race and creed. They 
stood shoulder to shoulder in fighting away death from 
millions of their fellow-men. 

Over all the famine-stricken area a network of local 
committees sprang up in short time. Everyone who 
could serve, and had the will to do it, was set to work. 
Here again the doors were wide open: true interest for 
humanity was the requisite. A large number of mission- 
aries were stationed in the famine area. They came from 
several continents and represented many differences in 
their beliefs and practices. On one point they were of 
one mind : They wanted to help. Everywhere they 
joined the local committees, often they were the ones on 
whom the main burden was placed. Their compounds 
became relief camps and hospitals. They carried help 
into the villages. They were everywhere and stood for 
all that was humane and right. In some cases the gen- 
eral committee in Madras knew of no one in a given 
locality who could relieve the suffering but some mis- 
sionary residing there. 

Our Telugu Mission was in the famine area. Our 
missionaries bore the burdens of those days. Dr. Downie 
was honorary secretary and treasurer of the local com- 
mittee in Nellore. I held a similar post in Ongole. Our 
missionaries in Ramapatnam living in the Ongole sub- 
division drew on me for funds to disburse. Dr. Albert 
Loughridge, who was in Ongole, went into the taluks 
where our Christians lived and carried help to them. He 
served on our local committee in Ongole, which included 
our submagistrate, our apothecary, an engineer and sev- 
eral native gentlemen. Our first remittance came early 
in November, 1877. I had asked for twenty-five thou- 
sand rupees to distribute. The general committee sent 
us fifty thousand rupees. For more than six months we 



258 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

were now engaged in disbursing money. Our Ongole 
local committee rendered account at stated intervals to 
the Madras general committee. The amount which 
passed through our hands was approximately one hun- 
dred thousand dollars. 

We drew on every available agency to help in the dis- 
tribution. Most of the taluks over which I had toured 
during the preceding ten years were in our subdivision. 
I knew many of the village officials. This helped me now 
in placing reliance on them. Especially in the distribu- 
tion of seed grain the village officials had to help us; for 
they could easily ascertain how many acres a man owned 
and how much seed grain he therefore ought to be given. 
Large remittances were sent to the tahsildars of our ad- 
joining taluks. 

Our mission bungalow was the scene of much activity 
during the months while the fields were sown again and 
again, until at last a good crop was ripening for harvest. 
Day after day Mrs. Clough and I were trying to meet 
the demand made upon us. We were now dealing with 
caste people, with Mohammedans, especially with the Su- 
dra landowners, when they came for seed grain. Many 
a family was destitute and needed a few rupees to make 
a new start in life. I sent the women and children to 
Mrs. Clough, who, with a force of helpers, was carrying 
on relief operations on the west side of our bungalow. 
She had a storeroom there, which we kept full of grain, 
also clothes for the aged and medicines for the sick. I 
was on our large front veranda, accessible to everyone, 
with a staff of workers to help me. We took up each case 
separately. Our helpers had ascertained the detail, and 
could tell the people how to state in a few words what 
was needed. There was much uniformity — all had gone 
through the same experience and now had similar needs. 
Special cases received special consideration. 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 259 

These were public funds which we were distributing. 
There was an exodus from the villages toward Ongole. 
My diary speaks of times when there must have been 
twenty thousand people in Ongole asking for relief. Our 
magistrate sent the sergeant and five constables to our 
compound to keep order. At four in the afternoon he 
had the drum beaten up and down the streets, and a crier 
told the people to go to their homes, as no more money 
would be paid on that day. My diary now and then has 
the record of some special day. On one of these Mrs. 
Clough and I worked steadily for five hours, and found 
that we had given to more than six hundred people of all 
castes an aggregate of nearly four thousand rupees. We 
placed the money in the hands of those for whom it 
was intended, or legitimate substitutes. There was a 
possibility often that the people were deceiving us in their 
statements. They had gone through bitter privation, and 
the silver coins in our hands looked inviting. Yet Mrs. 
Clough and I were not new in the country; we instinc- 
tively knew when we were told a lie. The helpers who 
surrounded us could detect discrepancies in the state- 
ments made. Besides, public opinion was speaking a 
word : we were dealing honorably by the people — they 
felt bound to deal fairly by us. 

Month after month our compound was the place where 
hungry people came to whom we were the only hope. 
The Pariah class especially besieged us. That submerged 
tenth of the population in our region would nearly have 
died out but for us. Groups of them lingered near the 
bungalow day after day : hunger was gnawing. We had 
men there to keep order ; the people evaded their control. 
After Mrs. Clough and I had done our utmost, standing 
on our verandas for hours at a time giving to the people, 
and finally had gone into the house and closed the doors, 
we still left a hungry crowd outside, murmuring against 



26o SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

US. We sat down to our simple meal, and they would 
have snatched our food if they could have done it. The 
servants used to tell afterward how they had to watch 
their opportunity to get our meals from the cookhouse 
to the dining-room, a distance of twenty yards. They 
held the covered dishes high over their heads and started 
on a run, to escape the clawlike hands that were stretched 
out. That whole famine was an experience which beg- 
gars description. 

Our Christians were in great want. Most of them 
could find no work to do, To many this made no dif- 
ference; they were too weak to work. A large number 
were sick. Few had grain to eat. Leaves, herbs, seeds 
of grass, and weeds were greedily used as food; for it 
was all they could get. Many died in consequence. The 
small children of Christians died in great numbers. Our 
preachers kept themselves informed. They gave me de- 
tailed account of how matters stood, and told me of the 
Christian villages where distress was greatest. I had 
money in hand, given by Christian friends in America, 
England and India, with the request that it be used for 
our Christians. I knew of no way to get it into their 
hands except to send it to them by our preachers. I felt 
great hesitation; for I feared the consequences of this 
course. I talked it over with them. It was decided that 
twenty of our oldest and most trusted men should go 
on this errand, carrying help. I gave to each several 
hundred rupees, according to the number of destitute 
families on his field. 

The men went their way, some forty, some sixty, some 
eighty miles from Ongole. They had orders to write 
down names and amounts in every village where they 
made disbursements, and to get a receipt in each case for 
the total amount, countersigned by the village officials, 
to bring back to me. They were to give to the aged, the 



AN INDIAN FAMINE 261 

sick and the helpless; they were not to refuse anyone 
they met on the way starving who asked for enough to 
buy a meal. Theirs was a hard task. They found men 
greedy and grasping in their demand for help. The finer 
feelings of family relationship were blunted as the strong- 
er members of families wrangled with the aged and weak, 
and begrudged them the help they were getting. It an- 
gered the able-bodied to be passed by. They never for- 
got it. Our preachers complained in after years that 
their position had thereby been reversed. The people, 
instead of providing for them as they had previously 
done, were now inclined to resentment because help was 
not again brought to them. Starvation is an experience 
that drags men down. Emaciated, sick, poor beyond ex- 
pression, our Christians had to regain their footing when 
the famine was over. It was a wonder that they had re- 
tained as much of self-respect and independence as they 
had; for it was a terrible experience. The famine frus- 
trated much of my hope for a self-sustaining mission. I 
lost ground which I never fully regained. 

The months passed and the distress grew less and less. 
Fair crops were harvested. There was fodder for cattle. 
By the middle of 1878 the people began to lift their heads 
once more and take courage. It was many a year before 
the traces of the two years of famine disappeared. The 
old prosperity was slow to come back. Wealthy families 
had become impoverished. Villages here and there had 
partly died out. The children who survived were stunted 
in growth. There were faces everywhere that never lost 
the look of starvation. 

Most of us who had made the distress of the people 
our own could now go back to our ordinary pursuits. 
The sense of human fellowship that arose among us 
men, who were banded together to save the starving, 
gave us a sustaining strength. We all were upheld by 



262 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

our sense of duty, which with most of us was nourished 
by our faith in God. The Hindus and Mohammedans 
were guided by the rules of their reHgion, which com- 
mand them to aid those in trouble. They lacked or- 
ganizing capacity in their benevolence. With amazement 
they looked on as we of the white race put all our practi- 
cal instincts and business talents to work in carrying on 
relief. They saw how we drew our motive largely from 
the religion of Jesus Christ. There was something in 
this that many a thinking man among the higher classes 
of the oriental race felt he wanted to absorb, even though 
he desired to remain faithful to his own religious tenets. 
The outcaste classes in several parts of South India 
turned to Christianity by thousands. Their power of 
believing had been touched. They must have died if 
the followers of the Christian religion had not saved 
them from starving. They discarded their idols and 
came to Jesus Christ. 



XVI 

NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 

Long before the famine was at an end I knew that 
thousands were believing in the Lord Jesus and were 
ready to ask for baptism. I knew that when once I 
opened the doors of the church to the people they would 
come in throngs. If was my intention to exercise the 
greatest care and, if possible, to avoid baptizing in large 
numbers. 

Regular mission work had practically been suspended 
while we all bent our energies toward keeping the starv- 
ing alive. The village schools were closed ; the preachers 
had given up their routine work. There had been no 
baptism since March, 1877. ^^ was understood by all 
that so long as the famine lasted, no one would be re- 
ceived. I explained to the preachers my reasons for this. 
They were not as clear to them as they were to me. How- 
ever, I held to my course. 

The people were knocking at the gates of the church. 
They made themselves heard. Letters came pouring in 
upon me voicing the request of groups of people — fam- 
ilies and villages. They wanted baptism. Deputations 
from villages came, some a distance of sixty miles, with 
village elders as spokesmen. They assured me that the 
request of the people was sincere. Their minds were not 
fixed on rupees : they wanted salvation for their souls. 
There was much similarity in their statements. They all 
had heard the preachers and me tell the story of Jesus 

263 



264 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

before the famine, but had not heeded what we said. 
Now, however, they understood better about our reHgion. 
They all declared they would ask no help from me ; they 
only begged for baptism. They wrote or said : 

"We are very poor; our huts are fallen down, and we 
have not much to eat but leaves ; but we do not ask you for 
money. We will not ask you for the smallest copper coin, 
even though we starve to death; but we believe in Jesus, 
and, as he commanded us, we want to be baptized. We 
can die, if it be God's will ; but we want to be baptized first. 
Be pleased to grant our request, and do not put us off any 
longer. May the Lord help us all !" 

Somehow the impression had gone abroad among the 
people that they could not be received into the heaven 
of which the preachers and I had told them so often, un- 
less they had been baptized. Life was terribly hard for 
them ; death was always at hand ; they wanted at least to 
make sure of the joys of heaven. I let them feel that 
their request was heeded, and that I was taking a deep 
interest in them and expected them to continue in their 
faith in Jesus. I assured them that the Lord Jesus knew 
all about them, and that if any one of them prayed to him 
with all his heart, he was aware of it. I told them they 
need not fear to die, even though not yet baptized; for 
Jesus would know them at once, and give them a good 
place in his holy heaven, where neither sorrow nor want 
could touch them. This comforted them. It did not 
reconcile them to the delay. 

During those months of waiting the preachers and I 
took a firm hold upon the situation. I knew the state of 
the whole field ; while they knew their own portions of it 
intimately. They gave me detailed accounts, and I 
helped them distribute their forces, so that all the con- 
verts were under instruction. I wrote of them : 



{ 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 265 

"In the meantime, the native preachers kept a careful 
record of all believers, and taught them as w^ell as they 
could. Each preacher seemed to have, and no doubt did 
have, special help from on high to meet all the demands 
of the occasion. Weak men, just able to read the Bible, 
preached with earnestness and pov^er, sometimes continuing 
their evening meetings until morning ; while the able preach- 
ers of former years each became a host." 

The preachers were ready for that which was now 
before us. Our three thousand Christians were ready. 
The Ongole church was in a condition, spiritually, that 
made large additions to its numbers possible. The faith 
of all had been severely tested. At the beginning of the 
famine, especially, many of the caste people demanded 
of the Christians that they should give up this new relig- 
ion. It was said over all that region that the demons and 
fiends of the land had gone forth, thirsting for the lives 
of men, because large numbers of Madigas had disen-. 
gaged themselves from propitiating them as formerly. 
Not only had the rain been withheld, but the demons that 
strew cholera like seed over the land had broken loose. 
They were angry — they had been neglected and set aside 
— there was only one remedy. The Madigas must return 
to their old-time duties. They were urged to beat the 
drums and to dance the sivam — the dance of possession — 
so that the demons might find expression through them 
and be appeased. It often took courage to refuse. Af- 
flicted twice over, through hunger and through the hatred 
of those to whom they had to look for employment, the 
Christians nevertheless stood firm. When the famine 
began I could write of them: 

"The Christians, though in great distress, are firm in the 
faith. I have not heard of one who has renounced his faith 
in Jesus, though the heathen abuse them awfully in many 



266 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

places, and charge them with being the cause of the famine, 
and urge them to return to the gods of their fathers. I am 
in receipt of the best of news as to the Spirit's work over 
the Ongole mission field. Many are believing in Jesus." 
(December ii, 1876.) 

Later, when the famine was at its worst, I wrote : 

"As for the Christians, I do not know of any who have 
actually died of hunger, though probably many have been 
attacked with cholera brought on by improper food. The 
Lord has been very, very good to us here. Though many 
have died and gone to heaven, though all have suffered from 
hunger, and, though abused by heathen and told that they 
were the cause of the famine, I have not yet heard of a 
single convert denying Jesus." (April 10, 1877.) 

Thus they held firmly to their trust in Jesus while the 
mass of the people were still putting their trust in idols. 

"Idols were worshiped at the beginning of the famine 
freely, enthusiastically; and Brahman and other priests 
again and again promised rain, seed time, and harvest; but 
all these promises had proven to be false. By the beginning 
of 1878 the mass of all castes and creeds were convinced 
that idols could not help them. Had they not cried night 
and day for well-nigh two years to their gods and sacrificed 
to them time and again, and yet the rain came not? Then 
when it did come, and they so piously sowed the seed, not- 
withstanding all their mantras, it rotted. Then the charity 
of English Christians enabled them to sow their fields 
again; but their idols did not keep the grasshoppers away. 
Many — and the aggregate would make a multitude — had 
so lost faith in the gods of their fathers that they felt that 
a last appeal must be made, even to Jesus Christ, as the 
one, the only living God; and about him, and how to call 
upon him so as to be heard, the most orthodox Hindus 
even were glad to listen." 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 267 

The general opinion at the close of the famine was 
that Jesus Christ, as the God of the English and Ameri- 
can people, was the one who had helped his followers to 
cope with the distress. The seed grain from which a 
harvest had finally been reaped came by his blessing. The 
caste people felt that he was entitled to a niche in the 
Hindu Pantheon. A great change was wrought in the 
minds of many in our district. The essential truths of 
the Christian religion were well understood by the mass 
of people, of whatever caste. Faithful, though un- 
learned, men had preached everywhere for eleven years. 
Bible portions and tracts had been for sale at nominal 
cost in every bazaar of the Ongole mission field. I rea- 
lized that the spiritual outlook in that region was very 
different in many respects from what it had ever been 
before. But there was no actual turning to Jesus Christ 
among the caste people. The Madigas only came. 

I was under great pressure at that time. My own con- 
victions dictated one course. My hesitation on account 
of Christian public opinion among the men of my own 
race dictated another course. Mine was not the only 
mission located in the large famine area which had to 
face an emergency of this kind. I noticed in the daily 
papers in India, and also in religious journals, that there 
were frequent references to "rice Christians" as a result 
of the famine. Often there were critical remarks made 
in a somewhat hostile spirit. If this was done where the 
medium course of enrollment was pursued, surely my 
course of letting baptism follow upon profession of faith 
would be open to much comment. Yet I was a Baptist 
minister and could do nothing else. I looked at the sub- 
ject from every point of view during those months. I 
was slow to act, until events forced a decision upon me. 

The first definite demonstration of the fact that I was 
dealing with thousands came at the end of December, 



268 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

1877. We were at that time hard at work in dis- 
tributing famine relief supplied by the Mansion House 
Fund. Plentiful rains had come, but adverse conditions 
still prevented a harvest. I had issued a call to the 
preachers to come to Ongole for a meeting, and had 
asked them in my letters, in emphatic terms, to persuade 
the people to stay at home. My hands were tied ; I could 
do nothing for them, and was unwilling to have them 
come to Ongole and find themselves disappointed. The 
preachers did their best. Some rose up in the night and 
started while all were sleeping. Before they had come 
many miles, they found that hundreds were following 
them. They persuaded many to go back to their villages. 
Nevertheless, a multitude came. 

The people refused to stay away. They came throng- 
ing into the compound. An impression had gone abroad 
that I was going to institute some new measure of relief 
by which they could work and live, as they had done in 
our camp on the canal. We gathered them together and 
I talked to them. I told them that I had no work for 
them. They were sorely disappointed. Then those who 
had come to ask for baptism raised their voices. From 
every portion of the crowd before me the cry rose : "Bap- 
tize us ! We all are going to die of hunger ! Baptize us 
first !" I was in a hard place. I could see that my rea- 
sons for refusing them did not convince them. The con- 
verts and the preachers were willing to trust me; they 
took for granted that I would do what was right by them. 
It was not possible for me to explain to them fully the 
motives for my hesitation. I told them that I believed 
they were telling me the truth about their faith in Jesus 
Christ. I prayed with them, and committed them to his 
care. 

To send these people home, walking the weary miles 
back, hungry, fainting by the way, disappointed twice 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 269 

over, was something which I could not do. As yet there 
had been no harvest. They were managing somehow to 
keep body and soul together. Hungry they were when 
they came, yet they were patient. They did not clamor 
for help; they clamored for work, and part of them for 
baptism. I asked the preachers to count them. There 
were about three thousand; half of that number were 
Christians. I knew I was mingling temporal help with 
spiritual demands. I saw no other way to do. Not even 
Jesus, my Master, was willing to let the multitude go 
hungry — hence the loaves and fishes. In an orderly way 
we arranged it, so that I could put a small coin into the 
hand of each person, enough to keep them from starving 
on the way home. They said salaam and went. This 
was on December 24, 1877. 

Perhaps what I had done was not right. At any rate, 
it was made impossible for me to repeat it. I now was 
hedged in by two forces, one representing the most dem- 
ocratic type of Christianity, the other the most hierar- 
chical. The spokesman of the one was Dr. Warren; the 
spokesman of the other was a Roman Catholic priest. 

On the day when I sent home the fifteen hundred who 
had knocked so loudly at the door of our church I learned 
that Father Theophilus Mayer, a Roman Catholic 
priest, was staying at the traveler's bungalow in Ongole. 
There were Christians belonging to his church in a num- 
ber of villages at some distance from Ongole, yet in our 
subdivision. I knew that he had been passing back and 
forth, carrying relief to them. The secretary of the 
Mansion House Fund also, some weeks previously, had 
called my attention to this fact. He wanted me to invite 
Father Mayer to join our local committee, so that not 
even a seeming distinction of race or creed might be 
made. I now took action in the matter. I wrote him an 
official letter and invited him to become a member of 



270 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

our local committee. His reply, dated December 24, 
1877, is still among my papers. According to my diary, 
he took dinner with us on the next day, being Christmas. 
We had a long talk. He placed himself in line with us 
and called on me for funds to distribute in that region. 
Repeatedly, in passing through Ongole, he was our guest. 

He was a man a good deal above the average in nat- 
ural equipment. I remember saying to him, "Mayer, 
they will yet make a bishop of you." I was correct about 
this. Early in his career the Pope appointed him Aux- 
iliary Bishop in Madras.. His death, widely regretted, 
cut short further advancement. In a friendly way I tried 
to convert him and make him what I considered a good 
Christian. He, in turn, tried to show me the error of 
my ways. I remember well how he told me that I was 
out of my rightful place among the Baptists, and that if 
I would become a Roman Catholic, even though a man 
with a family, I would be given a place I could well fill. 
As men we felt that we had much in common. In our re- 
ligious connections we both were working with our ut- 
most zeal. Perhaps I am not mistaken in saying that we 
looked regretfully at each other across the gulf of ec- 
clesiastical difference that lay between us, and wished we 
could join hands. 

When a few days had passed after that decisive De- 
cember 24th, I received a letter from Dr. Warren, which 
stirred me deeply. I had no need of telling him what was 
coming to pass in the Ongole Mission. Living on the 
other side of the world, he was describing it to me a full 
month in advance. Only a few sentences from this letter 
have been preserved: 

"You have been gathering the ones, the fives, the tens, 
the twenties. All right; all as it should be; all as it must 
from the necessities of the case be. That dispensation you 



I 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 27I 

must pass through to prepare you for another and grander 
one: the dispensation of hundreds and thousands in a day, 
so to speak. They will come, so many of them, in groups, 
whole villages, whole districts at once, that you will not 
know what to do with them or with yourselves." 

I began to feel the backing of the men of my denom- 
ination. If Dr. Warren was with me I could count on 
the rest. He had a way of sitting quietly in denomina- 
tional councils, listening to others. At a decisive point 
a few sentences from him changed the current of the dis- 
cussion — men followed his lead. In his letter at this time 
his spirit touched mine. I wrote a full reply, and told 
him that his prophetic words were already fulfilled. I 
described the recent occurrence in our compound and 
gave him my reasons for refusing the people. 

Then came a long letter which he had written slowly 
at intervals on his bed ; for he often had times of much 
suffering. It reached me May 12, 1878, when the crisis 
in my mission was coming closer and closer. To me it 
was a document of great value. I tied it in a package 
with other letters from Dr. Warren.' It was kept in a 
place which I considered safe. I went to it one day and 
found a small heap of dust where that package had been. 
The white ants had destroyed it. Like a true westerner, 
I was fond of my horse and relied on it, but I have 
often said that I would rather have lost my horse than 
to have lost that package of letters. In a newspaper 
article of that year the following extract from that de- 
cisive letter was made : 

"But suffer me to say it to you, and you may tell it to 
whom you will, shut not down the gate! I tell you God is 
in this thing, as he was in the miracles of Jesus. No, 
Brother, do not shut down the gate, let whoever else will 
do so wicked a thing." 



2*J2 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Another sentence in the letter stands out boldly in my 
memory and I have often quoted it. He wrote : 

"Brother Qough, what is this that I hear of your refus- 
ing to baptize those who sincerely ask for the ordinance? 
Who has given you a right to do this? You know how 
Table Rock, after hanging over that mighty precipice at 
Niagara Falls for ages, lately fell into the abyss beneath, 
never to be seen again. Thus you will drop out of sight 
if you continue to stand in the way and refuse to adminis- 
ter God's ordinances, no matter what your motives may 
be." 

This moved me profoundly. For Dr. Warren, of all 
men, thus to warn me gave me a sense of fear. Events 
were pressing upon me, no doubt. But I did not lack 
guidance. Here was a man who spoke to me with all the 
authority of a teacher — of a prophet. I knew he was 
right. I was bound to render a full and loyal obedience. 
Officially our relations had ceased eight years before. 
In a deeper, spiritual sense I revered him as my superior. 

Some weeks passed. The days were crowded with 
work. I was daily giving out seed grain. There was 
still a balance in my hands of funds placed at our dis- 
posal from the Mansion House Fund to relieve the suf- 
fering that lingered on long after the actual famine was 
over. Nothing further had occurred to force a decision 
upon me. I was waiting to let matters take their course, 
ready to act as soon as all relief had stopped and no one 
need therefore doubt the motives of applicants for bap- 
tism. 

Something now happened that urged me into immedi- 
ate action. A month had passed since I received Dr. 
Warren's decisive letter. Then, on June 15, I learned 
that Father Mayer and another priest had come to Ongole 
on their itineracy, and were staying at the traveler's 




JONAH G. WARREN, D.D. 

"Here -was a man who spoke to me with all the authority of a teacher — a 
prophet. . . . Officially our relations had ceased eight years before. In a 
deeper, spiritual sense I revered him as my superior. . . . I was bound to 
render a full and loyal obedience. . . ." 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 273 

bungalow. The inhabitants of Ongole during the past 
six months had come to look on Father Mayer as a man 
who was working in connection with me. They saw 
that there was fellowship between us. Concerning the 
differences that divided us, not even the most intelligent 
of the people had a clear idea. Our Madigas took it for 
granted that he was a man of the same Christian religion 
to which I belonged. When those who had repeatedly 
asked me for baptism now spoke to him about their de- 
sire for church membership he gave them a sympathetic 
hearing. I heard of this. The crisis was now on me. 

I lost no time. I went to the traveler's bungalow to 
talk with the two priests. It was all done in an amicable 
spirit, but it is safe to say that I never worked harder 
during any two hours of my life than I did during that 
interview. In a straightforward way they told me that 
their bishop considered it an anomaly that thousands of 
converts should be kept waiting, asking repeatedly for ad- 
mission into the church, only to be met with a continued 
refusal. Their church was having large accessions in 
other parts of the famine area. They intimated to me 
that if the religious body to which I belonged could not, 
on principle, allow me to cope with this situation, their 
church had no such restrictions. During the past months 
they had reported the condition of the field to their 
bishop. They had held back, expecting that I would take 
action. But now they had orders to gather this harvest, 
since no one else did. 

I appealed to their sense of justice. I told them they 
had come to reap where they had not sown, and that it 
was unfair, and all the world would say so. I told them 
that the Baptist denomination in America had supported 
the Telugu Mission for forty years and that the converts 
who were waiting for baptism had been taught by their 
agencies. I spoke of the dissensions which were bound 



274 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

to come if they persisted. The Madigas in many villages 
would be divided into two factions of the Christian re- 
ligion. Even members of the same households, not 
understanding the difference at the time, would find after- 
ward that they had been separated from each other. 

I asked them to wait a few months. They told me that 
they were now on their way north, to a council, where 
they would meet their bishop. In one month's time they 
would be ready to come back. They were willing to lay 
this matter before their superiors once more, and if per- 
mitted to do so they would delay in their return. This 
was a small margin of time granted to me in which to 
handle a situation that involved ten thousand converts to 
Christianity. It was all I could get, and I was glad to 
get even that. 

I want to say now, at the close of my life, that Mayer 
dealt honorably by me. He had it in his power to cripple 
the Telugu Mission. Certain advantages over us had 
come to him almost unbidden. He did not use them : he 
withdrew. There were no rival baptisms, no dissensions, 
and there was no proselytism. The story of Mayer's con- 
tact with our mission at one point in its history is the 
story of a just and fair course of action. 

My own plans had to go. My action was hastened. 
What I intended to spread over six months I did in six 
weeks. Perhaps this was what my Master, Jesus, wanted 
me to do. I can see now, as I look back, that it was 
necessary, perhaps, to bring some pressure to bear upon 
me; for I do not deny that I shrank from the load that 
was laid upon my shoulders. 

The day after that interview in the traveler's bungalow 
was a Sunday. Our chapel was full ; an overflow meeting 
was held outside under the margosa trees. My text was : 
"Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead." 



I 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 275 

After the sermon I told the congregation that in the 
afternoon an inquiry meeting would be held, with a view 
to baptism afterward. I asked those who were heads of 
households, and those who were village elders of the 
hamlets surrounding Ongole to come first. I wanted the 
leading men in the Madiga community of our vicinity to 
make the beginning. They had often requested me to 
receive them. I told them the time had now come. They 
were ready. My diary for June i6, 1878, says: "We 
baptized 102 to-day, 74 of these were heads of families, 
all men from Ongole." Now scarcely a day passed with- 
out examination of candidates, followed by baptism. I 
made the following statement in the official report to our 
missionary society for that year : 

"For fifteen months — from March 11, 1877, to June 16, 
1878 — we had not baptized a single person. Some here 
in Ongole, and about Ongole, whom I had known personally 
for ten or twelve years, I was fully convinced were new 
creatures in Christ Jesus. It seemed to me my duty to bap- 
tize them. I felt that I must, or fail to please Jesus. On 
Sunday, June 16, we raised the gate. When it was up we 
found it impossible, according to our sense of duty to shut 
it down again. In fact, to own the truth, I feared to do so. 
I felt that those whom I, or trustworthy assistants and well- 
known church members — pillars of the church — had known 
for months or longer, and who gave evidence that they 
had not only left idolatry, but also believed in Jesus as their 
Saviour, must be baptized, or that I must give up my com- 
mission, and get out of the way; of course, I had no idea 
of doing either. I only wanted to keep the multitude of 
converts off two or three months longer, that all the friends 
of missions might be free from doubts, although personally 
I had been convinced for above a year that the work was 
of God. But to delay was impossible, for God's time had 
fully come to glorify himself." 



276 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

The tidings now went over the country that the gates 
of the church had been raised. Call after call came from 
groups of believers, far and near. A staff of some of 
our most competent preachers was working with me, 
especially our ordained men. The converts from one 
village or group of villages after another came to On- 
gole. We gave our full attention to them. We talked 
with each person individually, and required of each one a 
statement of belief in Jesus as his Saviour. We ascer- 
tained by questions how much of Christian teaching had 
been intelligently grasped. The Christian village elders 
cooperated with us. They could bear testimony to the 
outward evidence of Christian life in the candidates. In 
this careful, deliberate way, we baptized nearly 2,000 
converts during the remaining two weeks of June, nearly 
all of them living within a radius of twenty miles of 
Ongole. 

Letters and messengers and deputations were coming 
from every part of the field. The people wanted to 
know when it would be their turn. The preachers asked 
me to tell them my plans. They felt the pressure. I 
did not see my way clearly, and wanted to confer with 
them. It was necessary that there should be full under- 
standing among us all, and concerted action, not only 
in receiving the candidates into the church, but in caring 
for them afterwards. I was not satisfied with the dis- 
organized state of our work, and wanted some of our 
former stability to come into evidence as soon as pos- 
sible. Our more than forty village schools were all 
broken up when the famine began. The thatch which 
had covered the schoolhouses had been fed to the starv- 
ing buffaloes. The heavy rains had finished the work 
of devastation. I had money in hand to rebuild the old 
schoolhouses and erect thirty-five new ones in as many 
villages. These were needed as rallying places for the 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 'Z'JJ 

Sunday meetings of our Christians. Other preparation 
was needed before receiving large accessions. All this 
I wanted to talk over with the preachers. 

I hesitated to call a meeting. If the preachers, six 
months before, were unable to keep the people from com- 
ing with them, I feared the same contingency would arise 
this time. Moreover, the inhabitants of Ongole had been 
murmuring against me because such numbers of people, 
and of the poorest class, were constantly coming to 
Ongole from every direction to see me. The fear that 
cholera and smallpox might be brought in from outside 
was not without foundation. Amid so much uncer- 
tainty, I became convinced that that meeting must be 
held somewhere at a distance from Ongole. There was 
a little town, Vellumpilly, ten miles north of Ongole, on 
the main road. It would save many of our workers ten 
miles of walking if we met there. A traveler's bungalow 
would afford shelter to me, and there was a grove 
of tamarind trees close to it, giving shade to all. We 
sent letters to the preachers and teachers to come to 
this place on a given date. I urged them to per- 
suade the converts to be patient a little longer. We were 
prepared now to take up their case, and would soon 
inform them of our plans on their behalf. 

The time came. The first preachers arrived at Vel- 
lumpilly and sent an urgent messenger to me. They 
had done their utmost to keep the people from coming, 
yet thousands were either there or on the way. Not 
a preacher arrived but there were hundreds with him. 
The numbers were already overwhelming. I hastened 
off, determined to do all in my power to get the people 
to go back to their homes. Starting before dawn, I 
reached Vellumpilly in the early morning. I found four 
of the preachers there in advance of the rest, anxiously 
looking for me, and with them were between two and 



278 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

three thousand people. More were coming; for the 
preachers from the Kanigiri, PodiH and Cumbum taluks 
had not yet arrived. If the men who had already come 
had not been able to keep the converts from coming with 
them, it was not to be expected that the rest would be 
more successful. 

My first thought was that I must do something to 
make them all willing to turn back to their villages. 
Many were among the fifteen hundred who had come 
to Ongole six months before and had then been sent 
home. They all had been in our camp on the canal 
during the famine. They had been together there, and 
they were together here. They were not afraid of num- 
bers. Moreover, they had a feeling that my hesitation 
with regard to receiving them was unfair. They had 
worked their way through the famine — it had been 
hard work. The men had hands that showed that they 
had used pick and shovel. The women had carried the 
baskets of earth on their heads till their hair was worn 
off. As for actual famine charity, they had received 
almost nothing. They now were determined to be 
treated as people who had toiled with their hands. They 
were bound to make me and everybody else understand 
that they were seeking salvation for their souls. 

I decided to preach to them, to strengthen their faith, 
and then to ask them to return. On one side of the 
traveler's bungalow there were large banyan trees, which 
gave shade. The preachers seated the people on the 
sandy ground under the trees. There was a wide wall, 
four feet high, around the bungalow. I mounted this 
as a pulpit. We sang several of our best known hymns. 
Most of the people had not, until recently, known how to 
sing, but they joined heartily. I preached to them for 
an hour on that verse which they had heard so often 
during their stay in our camp on the canal: "Come 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 2/9 

unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I 
will give you rest/* It struck the keynote of the in- 
gathering". 

They gave me close attention. When I came to the 
point, however, where I requested them now to go home 
to their villages, to be good Christians, and serve our 
Lord Jesus faithfully, I met with opposition. Voices 
were raised against me. There was the murmur of 
dissent. I told them I had no more famine help to give 
them. Then the cry rose from every portion of the 
crowd : *'We do not want help. By the blisters on our 
hands we can prove to you that we have worked and will 
continue to work. If the next crop fail, we shall die. 
We want to die as Christians. Baptize us, therefore!" 

I stood there on the wall, looking into their faces. 
They were holding up their hands to show me the 
callous places in them, that had come by digging that 
canal. I knew they were telling me the truth. They 
had received few gifts of charity during the famine. 
They saw my hesitation. Again came the same cry: 
"Baptize us! We ask for nothing else!" Not a word 
could I say to them in reply. 

I came down from that wall and left them sitting out 
there on the ground, under the trees. I went into the 
bungalow. Here now I faced the crisis. I called in 
the four preachers, the teachers, and the Christian vil- 
lage elders who had come. I talked with them. I 
understood their side of the situation, but could not ex- 
pect them to comprehend the reasons for my hesitation. 
They could only dimly grasp the doubts that held me 
back. 

The strong tie of our close relation in the years that 
had passed now asserted itself. There was Sreeram 
Solomon, whom I persuaded ten years before to come 
to our school. He had become one of our best men. 



28o SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

In our camp at the canal he had taken a leading part, 
and had always been a man on whom I could rely. He 
now, with another preacher, had come from the Darsi 
taluk, followed by a large contingent of Darsi people, 
who had walked the forty miles regardless of protest. 
There was Baddepudy Abraham, one of the twenty- 
eight whom I baptized at Tallakondapaud when I first 
began work in Ongole. He told me that as a lad in 
our school he read about the 3,000 at Pentecost, and 
made up his mind to work till he saw that same thing 
come to pass at Ongole. Some weeks previously he had 
told me there must be 3,000 waiting in the taluks where 
he had since then labored as an evangelist. Numbers 
of them had refused to wait longer, and were out there 
now, under the trees; baptism was all they wanted. 

I had known that thousands were waiting. It is one 
thing to know that something is ahead; it is another 
thing to see it actually before our eyes. I realized that 
in all fairness I could not ask the people to wait longer. 
If I now disregarded their request, and sent them home 
a second time, I felt I would thereby well-nigh lose my 
claim to their loyalty. I knew that the preachers were 
right when they urged that the people would murmur 
against them, and refuse to heed them in time to come. 
Their future usefulness was practically at stake. 

I saw that the hearts of these men were burdened, 
even as mine was burdened, though in a different way. 
I said we would ask our Master, Jesus, to show us what 
to do. We prayed together as we had done many a 
time before. We had often found that when we had 
something difficult to face, and we asked him to help 
us, the load somehow was lifted from us. As we now 
prayed, one after another, for wisdom and strength, 
our courage grew. The hum of many voices was in 
our ears. The people outside were wondering when 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 28 1 

we would come out and tell them what we intended 
to do. They were patiently waiting. I began to feel 
that I must receive them into the Church of Christ, even 
though they numbered thousands. I told the preachers 
we must baptize these converts, lest we do wrong in the 
sight of God. They told me that they believed this was 
true. We were ready for action. Our doubts were 
gone. 

We now rapidly made plans. We were dealing with 
a multitude, and must be careful lest we find ourselves 
overwhelmed by numbers. Nearly 3,000 people were 
already waiting. More were coming. There had been 
harvests, and the people had brought provisions with 
them, tied in a cloth, enough to last them on the way, 
and for a day or two while waiting. If we kept them 
long, they would grow hungry. I had not money with 
me to give them each something as way allowance. 
Even if I had had the money, the little bazaar at Vel- 
lumpilly would not have been equal to furnishing sup- 
plies for so many. We had to act without delay. 

I went out and stood on that wall again, facing the 
people. I told them that their request would be granted. 
I asked them to go into the grove of tamarind trees, 
near the bungalow, and to form groups there, with their 
preachers. This grove of shady, old trees became the 
place for an inquiry meeting on a large scale during 
the following three days. I pointed out to each preacher 
a tree, or several trees, under which to gather the people 
from the villages which were his special charge. The 
teachers and Christian village elders were to give assist- 
ance. Each preacher was to make a careful list of those 
known to him or his helpers as persons who had given 
evidence of having begun the Christian life. There were 
many about whom there was no doubt. The preachers 
wrote down their names without hesitation. They had 



282 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

labored for the conversion of these men and women 
for years and were glad they had now come. There 
were others about whom there was some inquiry. 

My knowledge of the social organization of the 
Madigas now helped me. In that tamarind grove each 
group naturally was subdivided into villages, and each 
village into families. The tribal spirit, the communal 
life, and family cohesion, all came into play. There 
were village elders among the converts. They knew 
that they would lose none of the authority which their 
village system had given them. By their baptism they 
practically became deacons, and the old authority was 
to be exercised under the new regime. As I went about 
in that grove, helping the preachers, I reached conclu- 
sions in my own way. I knew my field. I had learned 
that villages have characteristics like individuals. When 
the men and women of a village stood before me, I 
could tell in a general way what might be expected from 
them, seconded by the preacher or teacher or Bible 
woman who had instructed them. I knew families, too. 
There were families whose members by a foregone 
conclusion could be trusted in their religious profession, 
as in other matters. There were other families whose 
members had to be helped in their good intentions. 

By long practice I had acquired a faculty of reading 
these Madiga faces. I was forced to do this, lest I 
be deceived too often. The people said sometimes, "It 
is of no use to tell lies to our Clough Dhora; he can 
look through our eyes, and take the untruths out of 
our heads and show them to us." Often when the 
preachers had done their work with a group of con- 
verts, and had placed them in line for me to see, I 
walked along the line several times, and then began to 
pick out one here, and one there, asking them to stand 
on one side. After talking with them, I generally advised 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 283 

them to wait, and learn more. Then the preachers smiled 
and said that they, too, had had doubts, but lacking suf- 
ficient reason for rejecting these candidates, had allowed 
them to stand in line. We used our habits of dis- 
crimination. What we had done all along, we did 
now, only on a larger scale. 

The preachers had simple buv conclusive signs by 
which they knew whether a man was converted. They 
said : "When men stopped drinking intoxicating sarai, 
and fighting, and eating carrion, and working on Sun- 
days, and bowing to idols, we knew that there was a 
change. They came then and sat with the Christians, 
when they sang hymns and prayed, and were willing to 
listen when we told them about our Lord Jesus." With 
a few questions now, in that grove, the preachers could 
ascertain the definiteness with which the step was taken, 
whether the essential truths of the Christian religion 
had been comprehended and the life of Jesus had become 
a reality. They asked the converts whether they were 
ready to prove their faith in the Christ by facing the 
hardships which might arise. It would have been dif- 
ficult to find a more ignorant, downtrodden multitude 
of people on the face of the earth than these were. 
Yet we somehow could tell whether they had taken a 
firm hold upon the life which is in Jesus Christ. 

There were many whom we had to refuse. They 
had come because the rest came. Thousands went away, 
rejected. We did it in all kindness. Most of them were 
received a year or two later. Some were permanently 
weaned from us. When the preachers afterwards came 
to their villages, they would not give them a welcome. 
They said, "We came to Vellumpilly to be baptized and 
were set aside. Now go to those whom you then re- 
ceived." This was the hard part of it. The preachers 
often said afterwards that they had little trouble to keep 



284 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

those who were baptized from straying. The trouble 
came through those whom we refused. Yet we knew 
of no other way to do. 

The tamarind grove was close to the Gundlacumma 
River, one of the largest rivers of that region, which 
was forded at ordinary times, and crossed on rafts in 
the rainy season. The river bed was about an eighth 
of a mile across. The military high road from Ongole 
to Hyderabad led down a steep incline to the river at 
right angles. Just above the place where the road en- 
tered the river, the traveler's bungalow had been located, 
and the grove of trees had been planted. At this time, 
owing to the recent rains, the river was full, but not 
overflowing its banks. At the juncture of road and 
river we found the right depth of water for our purpose. 
Nothing could have met our needs better than the nat- 
ural facilities here offered, with the shady grove, and 
the river with an ample river bank. 

We began baptizing in the afternoon of that first day, 
July 2, 1878. The total of that day was 614. The 
people of the Darsi taluk had been the first. We gath- 
ered them together toward evening and I talked with 
them. I told them to serve the Lord Jesus faithfully. 
With happy faces they promised to stand firmly in their 
new life. I prayed with them and committed them 
to our Master and his care, and sent them on their way. 
Thus I did with one company after another. I encour- 
aged those who were going home disappointed. I told 
them what to do, and how to increase their knowledge 
and faith. I assured them that we wanted them to grow 
in Christian life and then to unite with us. When night 
fell the first day, large numbers were on their way home, 
but equal numbers were on the way, coming. 

Early the next morning Thaluri Daniel came with 
Podili people. The Kanigiri preachers had arrived with 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 285 

a large contingent. Anumiah came with people from 
the Cumbum and Markapur taluks. Bezwada Paul was 
there with a large number. They all told me that the 
people, wholly oblivious to their protests, had contentedly 
walked several nights in succession, resting during the 
heat of the day, where they could find shade. There 
was the sound of many voices around that bungalow. 
The grove was swarming with people. My diary, giv- 
ing only short entries of facts, said there must have 
been 5,000 people present that morning. As the Hindus 
calculate crowds, there were "five acres of people.'* 

The preachers and I now worked as one man. There 
was complete understanding between them and me. We 
were accustomed to dealing with large numbers, but this 
was more than we had ever seen. We held firmly to- 
gether. The people saw that we knew what we were 
doing, and when we gave an order, they obeyed us. 
Baptismal scenes on the banks of rivers were not new 
to us. Ten years before I talked of dedicating the 
rivers of that region by baptizing converts into them, in 
the name of Jesus. The only difference now lay in 
the numbers. But we had known for some time that 
something of this kind was bound to come. We now 
held to our course. 

On the second day, Wednesday, July 3, 1878, we 
began early. When the sun rose, a large group was by 
the river bank. A still larger group was in the grove. 
The old preachers of the mission were in full force in 
both places. Periah was there. All the men, who long 
before had sat at the feet of Raja Yoga teachers and then 
had led their people into the heritage of a new religion, 
were there. Humbly and conscientiously they per- 
formed the strenuous task of that day. Their labors 
had brought back the days of early Christianity. The 



286 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Lord Jesus could not have been far away. His name 
was spoken that day thousands of times. 

At half past four, just at sunrise, we began to bap- 
tize. We had a great day's work before us. With a 
short intermission at noon, we continued the baptism till 
sunset. Each preacher had the list of those who were 
baptized from his field. When in the evening we put 
the lists together, we found that we had baptized that 
day 2,222. 

We had not finished. There were still many left. We 
began the third day soon after sunrise, and continued 
till ten o'clock — just five hours. The number was 700. 
The three days brought us the total of 3,536. 

I did not baptize anyone myself during those days. 
Some one with authority had to be there to direct, and 
to see that order prevailed. I stood on a bank, ten feet 
high, overlooking the baptismal scene, and at the same 
time close to the grove. To those near by I could call 
from where I stood; to those at a little distance I sent 
messengers, telling them what to do. I was in touch 
with everyone and knew what was going on every- 
where. Often I left my place on the bank and went 
about in the grove, helping the preachers. We had 
to hold out against the pressure of those whom we 
had to refuse. It saved the preachers from the ill-will 
of disappointed ones, if I came and spoke a decisive 
word. Then I went back to the bank. I knew I was 
witnessing a great event. I had the feelings of a man 
who is doing his duty, no matter what the consequences 
may be. I submitted to the hand of God. 

Our six ordained men were there. They took turns, 
two officiating at a time. The names of the candi- 
dates were read. Without delay and without confusion 
one followed another. As one preacher pronounced the 










a ^ ° ■^ xT § <=ji 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 287 

formula: "I baptize thee in the name of the Father, 
the Son, and the Holy Ghost," the other preacher had a 
candidate before him, and was ready again to speak 
those words and to baptize him likewise. 

Whenever the people from a taluk, who were going 
home together in the same direction, were ready, they 
came to ask, in the oriental way, for permission to go 
home. From all I took the promise that they would be 
faithful Christians. With them all I prayed, committing 
them to the Lord Jesus, and asking him to keep them 
in his care even unto death. With many salaams they 
turned homeward, giving little thought to the weary 
miles that stretched out before them. 

On the afternoon of the third day I returned to 
Ongole. Our work was not yet done. I held a con- 
ference with the preachers. They felt deeply concerned 
about the three or four thousand more who were out on 
the field, waiting for baptism. They had obeyed my 
request and had stayed at home. It would cause them 
sore disappointment when now they heard that if they 
had come they might have been received. They would 
grow disheartened with long waiting. The preachers 
urged me to do something about this, and without 
delay. They felt they could not go back to their fields 
and meet these people, and try to satisfy them with 
mere promises. They wanted something definite to be 
done in the matter. I saw that they were right. 

We decided to fix on two centers which the people 
could easily reach, one in the direction of Kanigiri and 
Podili and Darsi; the other toward the north, where 
the people from the northern taluks could easily come. 
If I were to go to both those centers, it would con- 
sume a good deal of time, calculating for delays by rain 
and bad roads and other possibilities. I proposed to 
the men that I come to the northern center, and that I 



288 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

ask Dr. Williams to go to the southern center. By his 
work in the seminary he had come in touch with many 
of the preachers and Christians, especially from the 
southern taluks. They agreed to this. They told me 
they would do preliminary work on their fields, and 
have everyone in readiness. If I sent them messengers 
a day or two before Dr. Williams and I expected to 
reach those centers, they would have the people as- 
sembled. They went on their errand, and I meanwhile 
sent an urgent request to Dr. Williams, who was on the 
Nilgiri Hills at the close of the seminary vacation, to 
come without delay and help us. He came, and, as an 
eye-witness, sent the following account to Boston : 

"In answer to the earnest pleadings of Brother Clough 
for help, I went to Ongole a few days before the seminary 
opened. I intended to return very soon, but found that the 
demand for help was so great that duty was clear. Brother 
Clough and his helpers were literally crowded upon by the 
people who were pressing into the kingdom of God. I saw 
what few missionaries have seen. 

"More than a thousand people from one of the Ongole 
hamlets came into the compound, and gave up their idols. 
They showed how they had worshiped them in former 
times with music and dancing around the idols, and then 
said that henceforth they would worship the living God, 
who had helped them in time of trouble. They declared 
that they believed in Christ, the only Saviour of the world. 
Brother Clough accepted their idols as trophies of the 
cross, and with earnest words exhorted them to continue 
steadfast in the faith. 

"Sunday was a glorious day. The morning was fine ; and 
the large meeting-house was filled, every foot of space, 
while a large number stood outside at the doors and win- 
dows. Besides these, many heard the word in other parts 
of Ongole at the same time from Rungiah, Ezra, and others. 
I had the privilege of preaching to the great congregation. 



NINE THOUSAND IN SIX WEEKS 289 

They heard the word with great interest. In the afternoon 
we saw about three hundred buried with Christ in baptism. 
"You will remember that I wrote in my last letter of 
the signs of the times. Great as this ingathering is, it is 
not beyond my anticipations. When we think how many 
earnest men are at work on the field, who go day after day 
telling the simple story of the Cross and pleading with their 
fellow-men to turn unto God, and remember what God has 
promised, who could look for less?'* 

All was in readiness. Messengers were sent out, as 
the preachers had requested. Dr. Williams started on 
Tuesday, July i6, and had his camp at Nundamarilla 
in the southern taluks. I started three days later and 
went to Comalpaud in the northern taluks. We could, 
not consult each other, nor was there any need of it. 
The preachers had complete control of the situation. 
Everyone knew what was required, and held to it. 
When I arrived in Ongole, after six days, I found Dr. 
Williams waiting for me. The harvest where he had 
been had risen to 1,850, while the total in the northern 
taluks had been 1,031. Most of these, had we given 
them permission, would have come to Vellumpilly. It 
would have brought the number there to 6,000. But 
it was well that the mass baptism was thus divided 
between three centers. It increased the definiteness of 
the events in the minds of all who partook in them, or 
heard about them. 

This finished the ingathering. In six weeks — 39 
days — we had baptized 8,691. During the remaining 
five months of the year we baptized nearly 1,000 more, 
making a total for 1878 of 9,606. Our church member- 
ship at the close of 1878 was 12,804, living in about 
400 villages. The number of our adherents was very 
large. The Madiga community was stirred. Those 



290 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

who were baptized were all Madigas, with the exception 
of a few who were Malas, or men of subcastes. It was 
a tribal movement. The caste people looked on, and saw 
the submerged tenth of their social order shaken in the 
grip of a power that tended toward something higher. 
It was the day of early Christianity over again, when 
"the common people heard him gladly.'* 

Almost before we knew it, it was all over. The 
prophecies of the founder of the mission, forty years 
before, had come to pass. The "much people" of Dr. 
Jewett were there. The "multitude of the elect" of 
which I began to talk soon after landing in India was 
now before my eyes. The "being too busy baptizing" 
to be able to attend to anything else, which was one 
of Mr. Timpany's visions, had happened. It all 
evidently had to come. It was in the divine plan. 

We may dwell on all the circumstances of the case: 
the many years of work which had preceded this event, 
and the tendency toward this movement by reason of 
tribal spirit and family cohesion. We may admit also 
that motives of greed fostered by the memory of Chris- 
tian benevolence during the famine may have lurked 
in many a head. Yet though we take this all into con- 
sideration, we shall find that we have given only a 
partial explanation. Jesus was in it. He had slowly 
led up to this; he made me willing to take up the 
load ; and he kept that multitude afterwards from going 
astray. 

A cyclone came and altered the course of the Gundla- 
cumma River at Vellumpilly. The place of the great 
baptism was washed away ; the bank where I stood fell ; 
the grove of tamarind trees was uprooted. Most of the 
multitude have gone to be with Jesus. Those faithful 
preachers, too, have gone. I am still here, but cannot 
remain long. Jesus only is left. He still reigns. 



XVII 

CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 

Two lines of action were open to me now regarding 
the event which had come to pass in the Ongole Mission. 
One was to place it prominently before the public in 
articles which I might have written. The other was to 
send the plain, simple facts to headquarters in Boston, 
and let the officers of our society deal with the publica- 
tion of them. I chose the latter course. 

Under much pressure of work I began a letter to 
Boston. Brief in stating the fact that we had raised 
the gates of the church and were now receiving converts 
almost daily, my letter carried an urgent appeal for help. 
I told of the way other missionary societies were meet- 
ing similar emergencies. One of these had sent to India 
ten new missionaries. I added: 

"Here, with an equal or greater harvest, I am all alone. 
Send help at once — men and money. Do not plead hard 
times. God has the money, and will give it if you call; else, 
it seems to me, a mistake is being made here in calling so 
many to righteousness." 

This letter was left unfinished on my desk when I 
hastened oflF to Vellumpilly, determined to persuade the 
multitude to turn back home. Three days later I re- 
turned, and the following morning I proceeded, as a first 
duty, to close up that letter. I gave all the dates and 

291 



292 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

figures thus far. I said, "The Lord hath done great 
things for us, whereof we are glad." I closed with an 
appeal, "Send out the best Baptist pastor and evangelist 
in all America at once. Do not delay." It was a dis- 
connected letter, full of repetitions, holding itself to the 
facts, bearing on the face of it the evidence of being 
the document of a man who is bound to state what has 
happened, and is clamoring for adequate backing. 

When this letter reached Boston, Dr. Warren heard 
of it. He came in from his home in Newton Center 
and went to Dr. Murdock's office. Leaning on his cane, 
grown prematurely old through suffering, yet with the 
keen, indomitable eye of a prophet, he asked for that 
letter. He wanted all the details that had thus far been 
received. He sat and read it all, and pondered. The 
door was then closed : those two men knelt to pray. Six 
years later, after I had come home just in time to say 
good-bye to Dr. Warren, with a last grasp of the hand, 
Dr. Murdock told me of that prayer: "How he loved 
you and prayed for you . . . that the Lord would bear 
you up under the great pressure, that he would keep the 
'babes in Christ' as he called them." From this office, 
where two men knelt together and took counsel together, 
the tidings of the Ongole ingathering were sent over the 
Christian world. 

I could count on those two men. Dr. Warren was 
the prophet of my day. Dr. Murdock furnished support 
of a different type. His mind was of the legal cast. 
With a wide sweep of statesmanship, he knew how to 
grasp a situation and hold it with a firm hand. He sus- 
tained me during those critical years, and wrote to me 
afterwards, "In season and out of season I have stood by 
your work and your methods of work." With a mas- 
terly reticence and moderation he now became the spokes- 
man in America of that movement in the Far East. 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 293 

The simple, bare facts of the case were allowed to 
make their way, unaided. My letter was printed in full 
in the Baptist Missionary Magazine for September, 1878. 
A short editorial paragraph called attention to it, and 
asked, "Do the records of modern missions contain any- 
thing like this?" There were no head-lines, nothing to 
catch the eye of the reader. The Missionary Magazine 
in those years was widely read. In many churches it 
was customary to hold a missionary concert on the 
first Sunday evening of the month. The warmth with 
which these concerts were held generally indicated the 
measure of zeal expended on home activities. When 
now my letter was read to the churches on these mis- 
sionary evenings, throughout the denomination, "many 
hearts were thrilled with the tidings therein communi- 
cated." The weekly religious journals took it up, and 
brought the information to a wider circle of readers. To 
many the story seemed incredible. Some were bound 
to find out what it all meant. They wrote to Boston 
and asked, "Can it be true? Is there not some mistake 
in the figures? Were there two thousand two hundred 
and twenty-two baptized in one day?" They were as- 
sured that the printers and proofreaders were not at 
fault. 

A great demand arose for additional information. Re- 
quests were sent to the Mission Rooms for further 
detail. At missionary concerts they wanted to know 
more. Who were these Telugus? The October number 
of the Missionary Magazine brought a lengthy editorial. 
The men at headquarters now spoke. They gave the 
side of the story that concerned the churches. There 
was an urgent call now, ringing through the denomina- 
tion. It was not the cry of some destitute, sinking en- 
terprise : it was the call of success. The Executive Com- 
mittee refused to be held responsible if there was delay 



294 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

in the response. The churches must rise and do their 
duty. Men began to feel as if they had the uttermost 
parts of the earth at their door in this loud demand 
from a Pariah tribe for a place in the coming of Christ's 
kingdom. Another long letter from me was published 
during October. I wrote: 

"Thousands more. I cannot write in detail. God was 
with us, and glorified himself. A multitude were baptized 
— 3,262 in all. These make, with those already reported, 
8,691 baptized from June 16 to July 31, inclusive. To God 
he all the praise now and through all eternity! 

"Our school at Ongole is now full of men of all ages up 
to forty years or more, who are trying to learn to read, 
that they may go to their villages and teach their neighbors 
and children to read 'God's letters to men.' I need, to meet 
the demand made upon me, two hundred teachers to-day. 
. . . Many could find most of their support among the peo- 
ple. So anxious are they to learn to read that, though the 
converts have no more than half enough to eat, yet the 
teachers would not go hungry." 

The leaders at the Mission Rooms, in touch with the 
life of the churches, found that with many the attitude 
toward foreign missions was undergoing a change. 
Calm, critical interest was being transformed into real 
enthusiasm. "Tell us more about your Telugu Mission," 
was the request from every side. Pastors and intelligent 
members of churches were "beginning for the first time 
to study with care and zeal the subject of foreign mis- 
sions." They frankly confessed their lack of definite 
missionary information. Those foreign countries were 
so far away, and they had been so occupied with their 
affairs at home — they felt ashamed to find that they 
knew nothing about those who lived on the other side 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 295 

of the earth. Other denominations began to take note. 
A prominent Presbyterian clergyman wrote, "We con- 
fess ourselves amazed that the whole Baptist Church 
in America is not so moved and thrilled with a holy 
enthusiasm as to more than double its prayers and gifts 
and efforts in a single year." 

My appeal for a helper brought response. Two lay- 
men sent their checks to the Mission Rooms to provide 
outfit, passage and support for one year of a missionary 
family. The man, too, was found. Dr. W. B. Boggs, 
with Mrs. Boggs, both from Canada, were on the way 
to India before the close of the year. They were familiar 
with the Telugu language, and were thus equipped to 
render valuable service as soon as they reached the field. 
They were a strong reenforcement. But what was one 
man, when ten men ought to have been sent — sent with- 
out delay? 

Next the Baptist Sunday schools were heard from. 
They were coming to the front, it seems, for the first 
time in denominational history. Those baptisms out in 
the Telugu Mission were facts that children could lay 
hold of; they were willing to bring their offerings for 
something which they could understand. One Sunday 
school after another sent something toward the project 
of sending forward another man, close on the steps of 
the one already on the way. It was missionary training 
for the rising generation. 

I knew nothing of this enthusiasm. Week after week 
passed by. I wondered many a time what was going 
to become of the situation. My Master, Jesus, must 
have upheld me and given me the assurance that I did 
right in baptizing that multitude. Yet my anxiety found 
expression in the following letter to headquarters, dated 
September 17, 1878: 



296 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

"I rejoice with trembling, not because I doubt the good- 
ness of God and his promises, but are the American Bap- 
tists going to stand by me? Or are they going to hear of 
the great revival among the Telugus, rejoice for a day, then 
forget us nearly, and leave the great multitude just out of 
heathenism upon me? I think of this forgetfulness of 
Americans, said to be a national characteristic, and at times 
feel oppressed. When at home in 1872-3 I often said, The 
Telugus are going to come to Jesus just as fast as the 
Telugu missionaries and the American Baptists are ready 
and prepared to teach the converts the "all things whatso- 
ever I have commanded you/' * But, brethren, this is a task 
which but few, either in India or America, can fully under- 
stand. When a convert is baptized, the hard work is only 
begun; for there must be precept upon precept, line upon 
line, here a little and there a little — or rather I should say, 
here a good deal and there a good deal. 

"The total number baptized up to date, since June 15, 
is 9,147. Is this too large a blessing? Is it not what you 
have been praying for? Are the converts unacceptable, 
because so many? Are we not after all the Telugus? 
We — my native preachers and myself — believe in the Lord 
Jesus Christ, and in preaching the Gospel. We baptize 
those only whom we have reason to believe He has regener- 
ated. How can we do otherwise? 

"Englishmen in India and England begin to look upon 
the Telugu Mission with much interest. They know that 
the American Baptists, professedly, provide all the funds 
needed for ordinary mission work; hence, until they know 
that you either cannot or will not do all that is necessary, 
I cannot ask them to aid in ordinary cases with money. 
They would think that they were robbing you of a precious 
privilege. . . ." 

Help was coming. A few days after I had sent oflE 
this letter, a cable message came from Dr. Murdock, 
dated September 25, 1878, containing five words: 
"Rupees eleven thousand for work." My diary says: 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 297 

"What glorious news! The Lord is again better than 
all our fears and weak faith.'* I could now proceed to 
draw into line every man and woman whose services 
were valuable to teach the multitude the "all things 
needful/' I subsidized these workers; the people did 
the rest. In scores of Christian villages the people had 
begged me to help them build a school house. They 
said if I would pay for the beam and rafters, they would 
erect the mud-walls and furnish the thatch. This could 
now be taken in hand. We filled our station school with 
prospective workers. Our most urgent needs were met. 
I saw that I was not going to lack support and there- 
fore took courage. 

The Executive Committee of our Foreign Mission So- 
ciety formed a stronghold to me. They were nine men, all 
prominent in their walks in life. Their point of view 
varied; some were eminent in the religious life of the 
denomination; others had business capacity; they all, 
somehow, believed in the movement at Ongole. Month 
after month they sat in council together and saw money 
poured out from the treasury upon mission fields that 
were stony and hard. When now the cry of much har- 
vest rang in their ears, they praised God. There might 
be risk in the numbers and in the ignorance of the con- 
verts: they were willing to take the risk. They bore 
with me when now I was continually clamoring for sup- 
port, and patiently explained to the churches what was 
needed. They never knew what unusual situation I 
might spring upon them, demanding a careful inquiry 
into oriental conditions far removed from their daily 
routine^ — yet they were unwavering in their loyalty. 
Leading men in the denomination sometimes expressed 
apprehension concerning the rapid expansion of the 
Telugu Mission. Some asked whether, under the un- 
usual circumstances of our growth, the tenets of our de- 



298 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 



nomination were safeguarded. The men of the Execu- 
tive Committee never showed anxiety. They had seen 
the hand of God moving in the Telugu Mission and 
were unafraid. 

From many directions earnest requests had been sent 
to the Mission Rooms to set apart a day for a special 
thanksgiving service, to be observed by all the churches. 
The Executive Committee, in a document signed by each 
member, called upon the churches to praise God in their 
sanctuaries on a day appointed by them — the first Sun- 
day in December, 1878. Printed matter was sent out 
to every pastor, and to every Sunday school superin- 
tendent throughout the Baptist churches in the land, set- 
ting forth the leading facts in the history of the Telugu 
Mission. Thank offerings were to be brought. It was 
a call for concerted action, the effect of which was felt 
for many a day. A few years later it was stated that 
the highest point which had as yet been attained by 
the donations to the mission treasury was reached under 
the spur of the interest aroused by the wonderful tidings 
from the Ongole field. 

A thrill of joy and gratitude went through the 
churches from East to West. Never before had the 
Baptists been so generally and deeply moved by tidings 
from their foreign mission fields; nor has there been a 
similar occasion since that time. The name of Jesus 
was praised in hundreds of churches on that Sunday, 
as large congregations sang their best-known missionary 
hymns, and heard of the spread of Christ's kingdom 
beyond the seas. Along the line of our three miles of 
canal the name of Jesus had been spoken all day long, 
while men were digging; it was spoken thousands of 
times during the days of the ingathering at Vellumpilly; 
it was repeated ten thousand times now, throughout the 
length and breadth of the United States, by the men 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 299 

and women and children of the Baptist churches. Orient 
and Occident were brought together. A long stride was 
made that day toward the larger sense of brotherhood, 
which binds together men of different races. 

Amid all the rejoicing, there were some in the 
churches who were "amazed and in doubt, saying one 
to another, What meaneth this?" They inquired with 
deep interest whether these thousands who had come out 
of heathenism had all experienced a genuine conversion. 
Revivals on a large scale sometimes swept over our 
Christian communities in America and England dur- 
ing those years. The religious life of cities and 
towns was shaken when some prominent evangelist 
joined forces with the pastors of a vicinity. There were 
accessions to the churches. Sometimes there was much 
falling away afterwards. Those who had gained an in- 
sight into the nature of revivals wanted to know wherein 
the Telugu revival differed from those in Christian lands. 
The reply from the Mission Rooms was that if those 
multitudes were merely renouncing their idolatrous wor- 
ship, and were flocking to hear what the teachers of 
Christianity had to offer as a substitute, it would be a 
remarkable fact; but that it seemed to be much more 
than a turning away from idols. Men were feeling after 
information that would give them the social background 
for that movement. They thought that in some form 
natural causes must have been at work, otherwise the 
event would have to be regarded as simply a miracle. 
I never attempted to explain that there had been a social 
uprising as the result of the coming of Christianity. I 
was so much a part of that mass movement that I found 
it difficult to point out to others the social causes back of 
it. We practiced the substance of what later came to be 
called Social Christianity. 

The "Lone Star" tract was in great demand. It had 



300 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

been written at an opportune time. Five years previously 
Dr. Jewett was in America, on furlough. He accom- 
panied Dr. W. S. McKenzie, district secretary of our For- 
eign Mission Society, on a tour for special meetings in 
the New England States. One night, after holding a 
meeting in some country church, they went to a farm- 
house to sleep over night, expecting to move on next 
day. In the little farmhouse bedroom they sat and talked 
far into the night. All the traditions of the Telugu Mis- 
sion with which Dr. Jewett stirred my soul on the sailing 
vessel, rounding the Cape in 1864, he now told to Dr. 
McKenzie: about the *Tone Star" debate in Albany in 
1853, about Prayer Meeting Hill, about his refusal to 
be transferred to some other mission. He drew out his 
pocketbook, and from it took a scrap of paper, some- 
what soiled. Handling it as if it were something sacred, 
he passed it over to his listener with the question, "Have 
you ever seen that poem?" It was the famous "Lone 
Star" poem. No one for many a year had seen it. It is 
said that Dr. Smith, when he was shown the scrap of 
paper a few days later, seemed scarcely to remember his 
own production, and wanted to know where it had been 
obtained. Dr. Jewett laid his treasure into reverent 
hands when he gave the "Lone Star" poem to Dr. Mc- 
Kenzie, who presided at its rebirth, by writing the "Lone 
Star" tract. It was ready when the ingathering came. 
In the years that followed, 300,000 copies of it went 
broadcast over the land. The "Lone Star" poem re- 
sounded through the Baptist churches north and south, 
east and west. It was set to music, and sung with 
thrilling effect, by vast congregations. 

The facts set forth by this tract seemed to furnish an 
explanation of the ingathering. Spiritual force had been 
engendered by the long years of holding on by faith and 
prayer. When men referred to the work of the Holy 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 3OI 

Spirit in modern missions they pointed to this as an ex- 
ample. To many, at that time, rehgion was a thing 
apart. That there should be fellowship between religion 
and social betterment was a proposition which had yet 
to be clearly enunciated. We men on the foreign field 
made our contribution toward bringing the possibility 
of union between the two into clear outline. The fact 
that our famine camp preceded the ingathering was to 
many the first lesson of the kind. They began by doubt- 
ing such mingling of the spiritual and the temporal. 
They ended by saying : Why not ? 

The story of the Pentecostal baptism at Ongole found 
its way into religious publications the world over. To 
the Baptists it was a denominational experience in 
which other religious organizations shared. Men of va- 
rious creeds saw that it threw light upon an important 
occurrence in the early Church. Thus far it had been 
taken for granted by many that the baptism of the 3,000 
at Pentecost could not have been by immersion, be- 
cause it seemed a practical impossibility. This objec- 
tion was now removed. It had been done on the foreign 
mission field, in a way that was upheld by the denomina- 
tion at home. Modern missions had furnished an illus- 
tration for the history of early Christianity. 

Men of large affairs and business capacity took note 
of the Telugu revival. They saw the spiritual meaning 
of it and were stirred. Naturally they were affected 
by the concrete results. The missionary motive de- 
manded an outlay of money. It seemed to them that the 
Telugu Mission justified investment. My requests 
sounded like a business proposition with a missionary ap- 
peal attached. They could not refuse me. Sometimes, 
when in America on furlough I went to rich business men 
who were known to be unwilling to give for missions, 
and told them how many thousand dollars I expected 



302 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

them to give for the Telugu Mission. They said I had 
come to the wrong person. Before I left their office they 
had mentally parted with their money, and their check 
followed later. It was our spiritual success that con- 
quered men who had achieved success in commercial life. 
Six months after the ingathering, a discriminating eye- 
witness came to Ongole, Hon. Robert O. Fuller, a prom- 
inent Boston business man, a member of our Executive 
Committee for years, and a man whose judgment car- 
ried weight. After his return, in answer to many ques- 
tions, at an important meeting in Philadelphia, he said : 

**As a stockholder in the missionary enterprise I wanted 
to know if the dividends were honestly earned and declared. 
Accordingly, in the course of my recent journey around the 
world, I visited, as far as possible, our missions in Asia and 
Europe. I went to the Telugu Mission, traveling 2,000 
miles out of my way and spending three weeks to do so. I 
found Mr. Clough in the northern part of it. I stayed there 
five days, and studied him closely. During the famine, such 
was the confidence felt in him that the government made a 
grant of several hundred thousand rupees, putting it all in 
his hands, asking no bond or security. He executed public 
works, and saved the people from starving. 

*T spent a Sunday with Mr. Clough. The chapel was 
crowded with people, sitting on the floor. I heard him ex- 
amine candidates. About three-fourths of those who applied 
were received. After the baptism I saw many of the peo- 
ple following Mr. Clough, and pleading with him for some- 
thing. I inquired what they were asking for, and found 
that they were begging for teachers, to go to their villages, 
so that their children should not fall away." 

This testimony gave confidence to many leading men 
in the denomination. 

A hard task was now before me. Mrs. Clough and I 
had been slowly coming to the conclusion that it would 



• 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 303 

be necessary on account of her impaired health, and on 
account of our children, that she should go to America 
and make a home for them there. The two older chil- 
dren, whom we had left behind in America when we 
returned to India five years before, had been holding 
out bravely without their parents, but they had been on 
our minds constantly, and we found the separation hard 
to bear. Two of the three who were with us in Ongole 
were of an age when India was no longer the place for 
them. Then there was my aged mother, who always 
remembered the time when she lived with us before we 
went to India. She, too, looked for our coming, and 
longed to find a home with us. We faced the situation, 
and found that we would have to break up the home in 
Ongole, leaving me there alone with my servants, while 
Mrs. Clough settled in Kalamazoo, Michigan, to make a 
home for our children and my mother. 

This question of the separation of families is one of 
the hardest we have to meet in our missionary life. 
I never forgot the look on the faces of my children, 
when they were led away and knew they would not see 
their father again for a long time. The weekly foreign 
mail days in Ongole sometimes satisfied the heart, but 
more often accentuated the strain of separation. Then 
when I saw my children again, the years of their de- 
velopment without their father lay between us. They 
had grown to young manhood and young womanhood, 
and I found myself under the necessity of becoming 
acquainted with my own children. 

It was a sad day for the Ongole Mission when Mrs. 
Clough left the bungalow and the compound, with tears 
she could not control, while the native people were griev- 
ing as if they were losing their mother. She had stood 
at her post for fifteen years. The people loved her and 
trusted her. I sailed with her and the children and was 



304 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

considering the plan of making a short stay in America. 
After we reached England, a letter came to me from 
Dr. Murdock, dated June 14, 1879, in which he said : 

*'We would all dearly love to see you and it would 
doubtless be useful if we could have a good talk. But 
there are so many people who regard the work in your dis- 
trict with a kind of alarm, they are so full of apprehension 
as to what is to become of the 10,000, that a knowledge of 
the fact that you are not among them would be quite dis- 
turbing, if not disheartening. In short, the Committee do 
not think it is expedient for you to come among us just at 
this time, unless you are able to plead a personal necessity. 
I am glad you have taken the sea-voyage, and we all hope 
it will set you up and make you strong for another good 
pull among the Telugus." 

Acting upon this advice, I took my family on board 
the steamer bound for America. Then I hastened back 
to the work which required my presence, and to the 
bungalow which I knew I should have to occupy alone 
for many a year. I had been absent from Ongole three 
months. Dr. and Mrs. Boggs had successfully cared 
for the interests of the work. The staff of helpers 
had been full of zeal. They now came to Ongole for 
a quarterly meeting. Dr. Boggs reported of this: 

"Five months had passed since the last meeting, a much 
longer interval than usual, and the workers were hungry 
for the affectionate counsel and hearty encouragement 
which awaited them. Brother Clough had returned the day 
before, after a few months' absence. The people expected 
him. It was a time of enthusiastic joy.*' 

The chapel was packed that Sunday. The accounts 
from the field were good. With the exception of a few 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 305 

cases of inconsistent conduct and partial conformity to 
heathen customs, all the Christians were reported to be 
steadfast in the faith. I felt the warmth of their affection 
for me. The outlook was good. It upheld my faith and 
courage. 

During that summer, in June, 1879, the Decennial 
Missionary Conference for South India and Ceylon had 
met in Bangalore. In this important conference twenty- 
five missionary societies were represented, from Eng- 
land, Scotland, America and Germany. It was an in- 
terdenominational body, of a kind which in later years 
became possible in the home land also. Men on the 
foreign field set the pace. In their need for fellow- 
ship they drew together in a common cause. Six days 
were given to the reading of carefully prepared papers, 
followed by discussions. Two good-sized volumes con- 
tain the records. 

A day was given to deliberation concerning the recent 
accessions to Christian missions located in the famine 
area, extending over parts of the Telugu and Tamil 
country. In five Protestant missions there had been 
more than 50,000 applicants. The Roman Catholic 
Church of South India had enrolled probably twice that 
number. It was a new feature in missionary enterprise, 
and all were interested in it. 

The mode of procedure concerned the men of the Con- 
ference, because in an indirect way they all were affected 
by it. The five missions which had had accessions 
were of different denominations. They varied in their 
methods. Four of them had pursued a similar course 
so far as the reception of these converts was con- 
cerned. They had baptized into church membership 
less than one fourth of the applicants. The large ma- 
jority had been received as probationers, who had placed 
themselves under instruction, and had been enrolled as 



306 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

such. It was a careful, cautious mode of procedure 
which had the commendation of all. We Baptists stood 
alone in the course we had taken, letting baptism follow 
upon profession of faith. The interest was therefore 
centered upon us. There was demand for informa- 
tion. I was in England. Dr. Jewett was present. Dr. 
Downie of Nellore read a paper on the accessions in 
our mission, and he stood his ground in explaining, and 
at the same time defending, our course of action. He 
had not been an eye-witness, but had informed himself. 
He explained the tenets of our denomination, and pointed 
out that I had adhered to them. This did not con- 
vince the men of the Conference. 

They all had come more or less in contact with the 
Pariahs of South India, and knew their clannish readi- 
ness to imitate and follow each other. They had found 
that the native church, also, was bound to be affected by 
this tendency. To apply the Baptist individualistic prin- 
ciple to Asiatics of this type, placing the responsibility 
upon the convert, seemed to them a hazardous under- 
taking. They - felt the missionary ought to shoulder 
the responsibility. Applying this to my case, it was a 
foregone conclusion that I could not be expected to be 
informed definitely about the spiritual condition of 
10,000 converts. It seemed to the members of the Con- 
ference that my course of action not only marked a 
departure from the mode of procedure of all other mis- 
sionary societies over the famine area, but that it 
amounted to a violation of the principles of my own 
denomination. The discussion was lengthy. There 
were those who were in favor of an expression of 
opinion from the Conference, as opposed to my course. 
Some one was getting ready to propose a vote of cen- 
sure. 

A man then rose and turned the tide. He was a mem- 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 307 

ber of the American Methodist Episcopal Society. For 
years deeply engaged in revival work, both in America 
and in India, he had an insight into the hidden springs 
and sources of great revivals. He knew that spiritual 
power is necessary to rouse even one single human being 
out of the apathy of everyday life. Where groups of 
men, and especially where a multitude of men woke up 
enough to inquire for spiritual truth — ^he saw a 
miracle. Large of build, and large of heart, this man, 
with a great, resounding voice, made himself heard as 
he said that while he had no personal acquaintance with 
the movement at Ongole, he yet believed that the Spirit 
of God was in it. He called upon the Conference to 
praise God for these converts. The chairman then closed 
the discussion by ''emphatically repudiating the idea of 
making any inquisitorial investigation into the recent 
occurrences in the American Baptist Mission." The aim 
had been simply to gain reliable information. I heard 
of it all when I returned to India. I cannot say that 
I did not feel it keenly. But I continued in my course 
unmoved, because I believed that God had shown me the 
way, and that I must walk in it. 

The whole question of dealing with masses of people 
who came out of heathenism, seeking salvation in the 
Christian religion, was at that time regarded in the light 
of denominational tenets. These movements were to be 
adapted to the inherited church polity. I had broken 
away from this, under the pressure of circumstances. 
When that Conference met ten years later, the scene had 
shifted. Other missions, notably the American Meth- 
odist Episcopal Mission, had come to conclusions similar 
to mine. The leather workers in northern India, who 
stood on the same lowest rung of the social ladder as 
our Madigas, were coming over to Christianity in thou- 



308 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

sands. There was no famine at that time, yet the num- 
bers were greater than with us, ten years before. Masses 
of people were seeking salvation. 

Again Christendom was facing the question of mass 
movements. More recognition was given to the fact 
that Asiatic peoples, of tribal origin, must be ex- 
pected to come in masses when once moved. An increas- 
ing number of missionaries saw that the question should 
be lifted beyond the range of denominationalism. We 
reverted to early Christianity. We adopted the mode of 
procedure stated in the Acts of the Apostles by receiving 
"multitudes both of men and women." We answered 
the people as Peter did, when he said : "Repent and be 
baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ 
for the remission of sins." The majority of mission- 
aries were conservative; they held that the only safe 
course was to receive the people one by one, or in small 
groups. Yet the fact that we, at Ongole, stood unmoved 
after our large accessions, and had seen no cause for 
regret, gave occasion to many to come to the conclusion 
that the policy of immediate baptism was not without 
testimony in its favor. Moreover, the churches at home 
took note. They saw that modern missions formulated 
a demand for a universal church of Christ into which 
masses of people could be received, unaffected by the 
differences which divide Christendom. 

Wholly above and beyond the questions of method 
and procedure, I sometimes came to feel the pulse-beat 
of spiritual life in the men who formed the background 
of the missionary enterprise. Never was this more 
eminently the case than when, in March, 1881, Dr. S. 
F. Smith came to Ongole. In his beautiful old age, 
with Mrs. Smith, he was making the tour of Asiatic 
missions. Like a triumphal march it seemed, as they 
proceeded from place to place^ while we all tried to 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 3O9 

make their journey easy for them in an oriental way. 
They were a royal couple. 

They stayed with me in Ongole ten days. Dr. Smith 
went about in the hamlets of Ongole and saw how the 
people lived. Many of our workers had come to On- 
gole to see him. I said, "Here is a man who has grown 
old in our Christian religion, a man who is counted 
among the great men of my country. Ask him whether 
the religion of Jesus Christ has ever failed him." For 
two hours, with an interpreter to help them, they asked 
him questions. Christians and caste people alike felt 
that they had some one before them far above the 
ordinary. He bore himself like a prophet of old, mov- 
ing about freely among the people ; even the poorest had 
access to him. 

One morning early we went to the top of Prayer 
Meeting Hill. The sun had just risen. We had a wide 
outlook. I pointed out one Christian hamlet after an- 
other, as far as the eye could see — all of them seen 
only with the eye of faith thirty years before. We sat 
down on boulders on the spot which many years before 
Dr. Jewett had pointed out to me as the place where 
that memorable meeting was held. We sang Dr. Smith's 
hymn, "The Morning Light Is Breaking." 

It was a wonderful occasion. Dr. Smith made a 
Mount of Transfiguration of that Indian hilltop. His 
face shone with an inner light. As for his prayer, it 
was indescribable. My diary of that day says: 

"Dr. Smith told me when we came down from the hill- 
top : 'I felt that I had lost my independent existence — that I 
was alone with God. I did not recover from this feeling 
until I recollected that I was asked to pray for future bless- 
ings, as well as give praise to the Lord. This done I fell 
into thanksgiving again.' '* 



3IO SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Later he wrote in his published account: 

"The heavens seemed to be bowed around us to over- 
shadow us. The Spirit spoke, not man. We seemed to lose 
our consciousness of independent existence, and to be moved 
by a divine impulse. It was not we, but God. It was not 
prayer so much as a rhapsody of praise — a rare experience, 
such as scarcely occurs twice in a human lifetime." 

The next day was a Sunday. In our crowded chapel 
Dr. Smith preached to the people a sermon full of 
consolation, on the words, "We know that all things 
work together for good to them that love God." Preacher 
Ezra interpreted. Converts had come; we held an 
inquiry meeting that afternoon. Dr. Smith went about 
among the candidates, and asked them questions. In 
an all-inclusive, patriarchal way, he adjusted himself to 
the limited mental horizon of the poor, ignorant be- 
lievers, who expressed their faith in Jesus Christ often 
by looks and gestures more than by words. Then we 
went to the baptistery in our garden, under the big 
tamarind tree. He baptized the ninety-six who had been 
received, speaking each time the baptismal formula in 
English. Preacher Ezra stood by his side and repeated 
it in Telugu. Dr. Smith felt it a fulfillment of the 
prophecy contained in his *'Lone Star" poem. Later 
he expressed this in the closing stanzas of another poem : 

"These are the plowman's garnered wealth. 

Born of his toil and pain; 
These are the sower's faith and tears. 

Transformed to golden grain. 
God watched the toilers at their work; 

And, when His wisdom willed. 
The pledge His loving heart had made. 

His loving hand fulfilled. 



CHRISTENDOM FACING A NEW PENTECOST 3 II 

"Then hail, Lone Star ! of all the wreath, 

Thou art the brightest gem, 
As once, o'er fair Judea's plains. 

The Star of Bethlehem. 
Shine on ! We learn to pray and wait, 

To toil and trust, through thee, — 
A star of triumph on Christ's brow. 

And faith's high victory." 

Three days later they left us. I said to him, "After 
your visit here are your expectations realized, or are 
you disappointed?" He replied, "Ask the Queen of 
Sheba how she felt. Her answer is mine, *Half was 
not told me !' " Again he said, "Last Saturday and Sun- 
day were the choicest days I ever lived." Then the 
mother heart in Mrs. Smith asserted itself. She re- 
marked to me that she feared when their son, an honored 
missionary in Burma, heard how the doctor felt, he 
might feel sad. To this he replied : "There is only one 
Prayer Meeting Hill, and only one Telugu Mission." 

Toward evening, March 17, the palanquins stood 
ready, not far from the bungalow steps, and everywhere 
there were groups of native people who wanted to say 
salaam to our visitors once more. We still had much 
to say to each other, and when finally we came out of the 
house and stood on the veranda. Dr. Smith looked 
toward the garden. He wanted to go to the baptistery, 
where he had baptized the ninety-six. We saw him and 
Mrs. Smith standing there together, communing with 
God, leaving their benediction with us. Our hearts were 
full. I rode with them two or three miles. The native 
Christians stood and looked after us, as we left the com- 
pound, many with tears in their eyes. Some said after- 
wards it had been "like the coming of God." To me 
their stay had brought spiritual consolation which I 
sorely needed. 



312 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

As I look back now, I wonder how I lived through 
it all. The Lord Jesus must have helped me or I would 
have run away from my task. The famine turned my 
hair white as it is to-day. Then came the ingathering. 
It was followed by the sense of isolation which men are 
bound to feel when they have hewn a track off the beaten 
road. When it was all over, the children, whether white 
or black, began to call me tahta — grandfather. I was 
an old man, though only forty-five years old as years are 
counted. 



XVIII 

A CHURCH OF FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEMBERS 

By reason of the famine and ingathering my usual 
long tours over the field had not been made for three 
years. I could go out only a few days at a time. With 
Dr. Boggs now attending to the work at headquarters, 
in Ongole, during my absence, it became possible for me 
to visit the Christians in their villages. In the middle of 
November, 1879, with plans all made for a long tour, 
I started. 

I was at my first camping-place, sixteen miles from 
Ongole, when something happened which taught me in 
an overwhelming way the instabiHty of all things human. 
On the afternoon of November 19th it began to rain 
heavily. Then it poured and then it was blowing a gale. I 
saw that we were just west of the center of a severe 
cyclone. After two hours the wind became terrific; the 
rain came in sheets ; trees were being uprooted or broken 
off, branches were taken up by the wind and carried off 
like feathers. My men had been digging trenches around 
the tent to keep it from being flooded. Now the pegs 
that held it, and the trees to which it was roped, were 
giving way. The tent was splitting, and I saw it would 
soon be in shreds. We dragged the luggage outside and 
cut the ropes and let the tent down. The men and I 
somehow made our way to the village, a quarter of a 
mile away, where we found most of the houses flooded. 

313 



314 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

The village munsiff allowed us to come into his cow- 
shed, twelve by eighteen feet. It was occupied by two 
bullocks and a cow, two buffaloes and four goats, but we 
were thankful for a shelter even as good as that. There 
were three hours more of violent storm. By sundown 
it had reached its height; the wind changed and the 
cyclone went elsewhere, over Ongole and Ramapatnam 
also, to carry destruction in its track. My six men and 
I were huddled together that night in a place six by 
eight feet in that shed, flooded with water, all as wet 
as could be. The munsiff gave me his blanket and an 
old sheet to wrap around me, and an empty grain bag 
to sit on. He brought a bundle of corn stalks for us 
to burn, and with it we kept up a fire all night, and 
thus saved ourselves from chilling to death. 

It was a fearful morning when at last daylight came. 
Such destruction! The women were crying all about. 
We pulled the tent out of the mud and succeeded in 
pitching it. Our clothes were drying. I was wondering 
how they had fared in Ongole ; nor had I long to wait 
for tidings. A man came bringing a letter from Dr. 
Boggs : 

"There is an awful state of ruin here. Though both the 
bungalows, the schoolhouse and the chapel are standing, yet 
there is an immense amount of destruction. All the dormi- 
tories are ruined. No one was hurt, thank God! ... I 
am taking it for granted that you are coming back as soon 
as you can get here. We are very anxious about you and are 
praying for you." 

I hurried home. The roads were washed away in 
many places and the bridges were gone. When at last, 
tired and hungry, I reached Ongole, the sight that met 
me as I came to the mission premises beggars descrip- 



A CHURCH OF FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEMBERS 315 

tion. The beautiful shade trees, which I planted thirteen 
years before, were so thrown across the road in the 
compound that I had to leave my pony and pick my 
way up to the veranda. Happy and thankful we all 
were, because no lives were lost. But what ruin every- 
where! Some fifteen houses in the mission compound 
had fallen. Tidings began to come in that upwards of 
twenty schoolhouses all along the track of the cyclone 
had fallen, and the houses of many of the native Chris- 
tians were down. The crops were destroyed and the 
question arose whether another famine was in sight. 

It took much work and money to repair the damage 
wrought by those few hours of cyclone. I wondered 
what all this meant. I wrote to Boston that I thought 
"our God means to show what he is able to do, — ^to 
build up here among the heathen, and then how easily 
he can undo all.*' 

But that tour had to be made. I started the second 
time, January 17, 1880. I was gone from Ongole just 
two months. I went over five taluks which afterwards 
became five separate mission fields. I could write of 
this tour: 

"I never had such a hearing by all classes before ; in some 
places as many as one thousand came out and listened to 
me attentively for an hour. I expected great things from 
this tour, because I knew that many in America were pray- 
ing for the Telugus. My hope was more than fulfilled." 

The preachers and I had made a careful plan for 
this tour. It was impossible to reach all the four hundred 
villages where our Christians lived. By camping in 
twenty-seven central places the people in a large num- 
ber of those villages were reached. They were looking 
for me. Their simple village customs were used to ad- 



3l6 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

vertise my coming. The Yetties, bearing- burdens from 
place to place, were like a daily gazette. The village 
elders kept each other informed along the route. Every- 
body was wide awake. In the hamlets along the road 
the people watched, and when they learned that the cart 
with my tent was coming, they interviewed my tent- 
pitcher and cart-men. They found out when I was ex- 
pected to arrive, and all the detail. 

On my way from one camp to another, I halted in 
as many Christian hamlets as I could reach in a given 
time. To each one I sent in advance one of my helpers, 
who had directions to bring the people together and have 
them ready for me in some shady place, and to invite 
the caste people to come also. Frequently I went to 
three or four such places before I reached my camp, when 
the sun rose high, and made it unsafe for me to be out 
longer. My stay everywhere had to be short, but I could 
say a kind word to the people, and inquire about their 
welfare. I always prayed with them and asked the Lord 
Jesus to hold them steadfast in the faith. It gave them 
courage and strength. 

Often the Christian hamlets were off to one side. It 
would have taken too much time to pick my way across 
the fields to reach them. Then the people came to the 
road. They waited for me for hours under some shady 
tree. I halted. If pressed for time, I talked with them 
from my saddle. I asked them how they were faring, 
and told them to put their trust in Jesus. It meant much 
to them. Following the oriental custom, I asked them 
to give me permission to proceed on my journey. They 
made many salaams and stood watching me as I rode on. 

It seemed to me sometimes as if I were a traveler in 
some desert, following a mirage, yet I was not deceived. 
Christians were beckoning me everywhere. They sent 
deputations of village elders begging me to come. They 



A CHURCH OF FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEMBERS 317 

sent letters, carefully written, inviting- me. The Chris- 
tians were warm-hearted; often they shed tears because 
I could not comply with their earnest requests to come 
to some outlying" village. My pony during those two 
months of touring wore out two sets of shoes. I had 
to have a double force of helpers and assistants to follow 
me. Whether preachers or tent-pitchers or cart-men or 
messengers, the men were worn out after a few days and 
had to rest and then join me again. It was a time 
of strenuous work for us all. 

My heart went out to this Christian community. The 
people knew that I loved them; they felt it. It was like 
sunshine to them. They had come out of great tribula- 
tion. There were traces of the famine everywhere. I 
could see it in their faces. The stunted bodies of the 
children bore pitiful evidence. I noticed a loss in self- 
reliance and a readiness to lean on anyone for sup- 
port. On one point all were strong: in their faith in 
Jesus. They were bravely rising from the effects of the 
famine, largely through this faith. I gave my full at- 
tention to the Christians, on this tour. In many places 
they had difficulties to lay before me that could best 
be settled on the spot. There were questions pending 
concerning their relations to each other and to the caste 
people. Many of these questions were of a temporal na- 
ture, yet the manner in which they were answered had 
its effect upon the spiritual life. 

When last I made a tour of this kind, previous to 
the famine, we had a membership of 3,000. Now we 
had four times that number. We had a staff of two 
hundred preachers and teachers. The Christian village 
elders came forward everywhere, and let me feel that I 
could place reliance upon them. I saw, as I went from 
place to place, that the Christians were greatly in need 
of more teaching and training. Yet often I had to tell 



3l8 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

myself that even if they had a teacher or preacher with 
them all the time, instead of seeing one only at intervals, 
they could not be more earnest in their Christian life. 
The Lord Jesus was doing this. He was keeping them 
firm in the faith. Frequently the only request which 
deputations from villages had to make to me was for 
a teacher. They wanted their children to be taught. 
They wanted to rise in the social scale. Not for rupees 
or temporal help did the people beg most on this tour. 
The cry everywhere was : Send us a teacher. 

When there was failure to lead the Christian life the 
trouble lay generally in the peculiar disabilities of the 
Madigas. The three precepts of the early days were still 
in force. The people held each other to them. "Do not 
work on Sunday; do not eat carrion; do not worship 
idols.*' It was still the program of their social uprising. 
Those who were weak in this were considered weak in 
their Christian life. Some had let their juttus grow, but 
now asked to have them cut off. In one village five had 
to be excluded for contracting infant marriages after the 
heathen fashion. In several villages there were exclu- 
sions for adultery. In one village eleven were excluded 
because they confessed that they had deceived us when 
they were baptized. It is a marvel that I did not find 
many cases of this kind. An entry in my diary speaks 
of going to a new camp. "On my way I halted in a ham- 
let and tried to reclaim two people who had been bap- 
tized. After two hours I saw that I had failed. I went 
on to the camp. Five hundred or more came out, of all 
castes, to listen. Many seemed to believe." I gave al- 
most as much time to the two as I gave to the five hun- 
dred. The people knew that I was unwilling to see one 
of them stray away. 

The number of baptisms everywhere was large. Many 
were waiting for me. Thev would have come to Ongole 



A CHURCH OF FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEl^BERS 319 

for the ordinance but for the distance. Moreover, it 
was always the better way if they could be baptized near 
their own home. It lent definiteness to the step which 
they took thereby. Large numbers everywhere were on 
the point of making a decision. They had been taught, 
and they believed in Christ Jesus. By the united effort 
of this tour the whole Madiga community of the taluks 
through which I was passing was stirred. Everybody 
talked about the new religion. There was strength in 
numbers. The preachers were hard at work. The vil- 
lage elders encouraged those in whom they had recog- 
nized evidence of a change. Often my sermon marked a 
turning point. There was a great turning toward Jesus 
as the Saviour of men. In twenty-eight places the bap- 
tism of large groups of people closed the day's work. 
There were cases where it could be said that they came 
by families. There were cases where members of several 
households in a village came, including the elders. These 
were henceforth Christian villages. One thousand and 
sixty-eight persons were received into the church on pro- 
fession of faith in Jesus during this tour. There was a 
harvest afterwards. Before the year 1880 had passed 
we had baptized 3,000. 

We had a great time with the village idols on this 
tour. Where families owned idols they had a right to 
give them up when they became Christians. It was dif- 
ferent where the idols belonged to the village. In many 
places they were still standing in shrines and under trees 
because a few families had held aloof from Christian 
influence. The fear was that the cattle would die and 
the crops would fail if the idols were removed. In some 
of the villages I had asked them for years to give them 
up; in some it was a recent question. Now everybody 
was willing. In order to eliminate personal regrets we 
made it a kind of triumphal exodus of the idols. The 



320 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

village elders everywhere were prominent in this matter. 
I let them fill up several bullock carts one after another, 
passing from village to village, piling on their idols to 
send to Ongole. Everyone heard of it. The people 
caught on. They decided what had been done in one 
village could be done in another. By the time I returned 
to Ongole one hundred idols had preceded me. Most of 
them were shapeless stones. Nearly all stood for demon 
worship of some sort. Hideous rites had been performed 
over many of them. The drums were given up, too, and 
the bells and all the other articles that go toward idol 
worship. My compound was full of the ruins of the 
past worship of the people. 

The munsiifs and karnams formed a prominent feature 
of this tour. They came forward everywhere, as if my 
visit concerned them. They came to my tent and I 
showed them every courtesy, asking them to sit on my 
camp chairs. Some of them listened so eagerly to my 
preaching that I felt they were almost persuaded to be- 
lieve in Jesus. My diary mentions them on almost every 
page. In one village, after I had preached to three hun- 
dred listeners in the early morning, the munsiff walked 
a mile with me back to my tent. In another village both 
munsiif and karnam came, and the latter urged me to 
stay another day. Often they remained to the service, 
sometimes they came with us to the baptism. I always 
talked with them about the change which had come over 
the Madiga community. In most places they told me that 
the change was for the better. They were glad this new 
religion had come to the Madigas. In a few places, how- 
ever, the village officials did not hesitate to tell me that 
the Christians were worse men than when they were 
Madigas, because to their other evil traits they had added 
insubordination. 

The caste people were never before or after so friendly 



A CHURCH OF FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEMBERS 32I 

and approachable as during those years after the ingath- 
ering. The stress of famine had brought us into close 
connection. I had been able to do a good turn to many 
a Sudra family over that region. They had come to me 
for help and had not been turned away. Later I had 
seen that all were provided with seed grain, and they 
had reaped harvests from it. This friendly feeling, 
mingled with gratitude, was still far from bringing them 
to accept Christianity, yet I was always looking for their 
coming. But they said, ''This religion has come to the 
Madigas. It is a good religion. It would be well if for 
us also such a religion would come." I remained to them 
the "Madiga Dhora.'' As Dr. Jewett used to say, 
"Brother Clough, it is hard work to convert the non- 
elect." The Sudras did not come. 

A new day had dawned for the Madigas, yet their old 
abject position was still in evidence. In one place where 
I camped, I faced a large company of angry Brahmans, 
who came to my tent for redress. It had happened, when 
I arrived that morning, that a large crowd of people had 
come with me. As I was riding along the road the Chris- 
tians from one hamlet after another had joined me. By 
the time I reached the bazaar of the village, hundreds 
were surrounding me and following me. The caste peo- 
ple, too, had come out to see ; the place was swarming with 
people. In the pressure of the crowd a Christian woman 
had touched a Brahman. The caste people considered 
this an intolerable state of affairs. They demanded of 
me that I should give strict orders to the Madigas that 
they must adhere to the customs in force since time im- 
memorial. They threatened to appeal to the government. 

I told those angry Brahmans that the street was for 
all, and if they did not want to be touched they must 
step to one side. Had I yielded to their demand, even a 
little, tidings of it would have gone over the country. 



322 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

The Madigas would have continued to walk in fear. 
Often I mimicked them. With a stroke of the hand, my 
hair fell over my face, then my shoulders drooped, and 
my knees shook. The preachers at such times played 
their part, they asked me, "Who are you?" I replied, 
"I am an Ongole Christian. There is a Brahman com- 
ing* way over there. Where can I go so that the air 
which sweeps over me cannot touch him?" Such non- 
sense went a long way. The people repeated it to each 
other and laughed. The caste people heard of it. My 
sermons were forgotten. . The way I played Madiga was 
remembered. 

The petty persecutions which came with the social up- 
rising of the people were still in force. Sometimes a 
wave of them went over the country. The village offi- 
cials took note of each other. W^hat one man was doing 
the next man copied. Then they waited to see what I 
was going to do about it. During this tour I had to deal 
with a case of persecution of more than ordinary severity. 
Everyone was watching to see whether I could effect a 
change. If not, intolerant officials here and there stood 
ready to take similar measures to bring the Christians 
back to their former condition of servitude. 

The persecution happened in a large village in one of 
the northern taluks. The persecutor was the munsiff, a 
Sudra. In the beginning he had the caste people with 
him. We had twenty-seven Christian families in the 
Madiga hamlet. A seminary graduate lived here and 
had pastoral charge of the surrounding villages also. 
His wife was the teacher of a flourishing school in the 
village. It was the prosperity of this little Christian 
group that angered the caste people. The serfdom was 
gone. They decided to take rigorous measures. A feast 
to one of the female deities of the village was held. Ten 
of the leading Christians were brought to it by force. 



A CHURCH OF FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEMBERS 323 

On the bank of the village pond they were told to dip 
themselves under water, and thus to wash off the effects 
of their Christian baptism. They refused. The munsiif 
ordered the Yetties to put long sticks to the necks of the 
Christians and push them under water. Then they were 
taken to the idol and forced to bow before it. With the 
warm blood of sheep the mark of worship was made on 
their foreheads. During a long, hideous night insults 
were heaped upon these ten Christians. Because they 
had been unyielding they and all the rest were turned 
out of the employ of the Sudras. They were not allowed 
to walk on the village roads and were forbidden access to 
the bazaar. This had already lasted six months. They 
were in great trouble. 

My tent was pitched in a grove near that village. I 
invited the munsiff and the leading Sudras to call on me. 
They came, and practically the whole town came with 
them; the grove was full of people. For three hours I 
talked with that munsiif. I used every appeal of his re- 
ligion, and of my religion, and of common humanity, in 
trying to persude him to change his course. I failed. I 
pointed out to him that he was violating British law. I 
told him "Queen Victoria is our mother, and you are eat- 
ing her pay. You are bound to treat all her subjects 
alike. These Christians are of the same religion as the 
Queen." It all had no effect. Night came, and I won- 
dered whether I would do right in leaving the Christians 
of this place to their suffering. 

At sunrise, sitting in the open tent, I saw the munsiif 
talking to some of the eighteen men who the day before 
had asked for baptism. They were running away over 
the fields, as if for dear life. I learned that the munsiif 
had said to them : "The Dhora was going last night. You 
kept him here. Now go away or I shall kill you." I went 
out to the place where the munsiif stood. I reminded 



324 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

him that the English Government metes out heavy 
punishment for such deeds as his, and that the loss of 
his position was possible. With a careless insolence he 
replied, *'If I lose it, what is that to me?" Then I ap- 
pealed to God Almighty. I said, "If the English Gov- 
ernment does not make you as if you had not been, God 
will wipe you out, unless you cease to persecute these peo- 
ple. He will reckon with you before many months!" 

I stayed that day, for I wanted to find some way of 
helping those persecuted Christians. I requested the 
munsiff to come with me to the well in the Christian 
hamlet, into which he had thrown logs of Tuma trees, 
because with their strong odor they made the water un- 
drinkable. I insisted that he must order his Yetties to 
take out these logs. I stood by while they did it. Then 
I looked for evidence, in order to help the Christians file 
a case in the magistrate's court. I went to the pond 
where the mock baptism had been performed. I took 
down all names. I did not see clearly whether there was 
a legal point there to take hold of and carry. I told the 
Christians to stand firm, and to tell the Lord Jesus their 
troubles, and to trust him, for in some way he would 
overrule events to bring them deliverance. 

When I was gone the Sudras remonstrated with the 
munsiff, and said, "What use is it to worry these Chris- 
tians?" He replied, "Though it cost me a cartload of 
rupees, I shall not rest until there is not a Christian left 
in this village." I tried to help them through legal pro- 
ceedings, but failed. Two months passed, and at a large 
meeting in our Ongole chapel some of those persecuted 
ones were present. They told of their troubles with 
tears. It seemed as if they could not endure more. Their 
children were crying for want of food. We took a col- 
lection for them. The preachers suggested that a cart be 
sent to Christian villages, and grain be collected for those 



A CHURCH OF FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEMBERS 325 

sufferers, here a measure and there a measure. This was 
done. All felt that God must send help in some form; 
for if that munsiif could thus drive a village of Chris- 
tians to the verge of starvation, and no one could stay his 
hand, what had they to expect where many village offi- 
cials were hostile to the Christians? There was much 
prayer and much anxiety, and the story of this persecu- 
tion was being told all over the field. 

Meanwhile the munsiff was suffering more than the 
Christians. A carbuncle had appeared on his shoulder. 
It defied the skill of native physicians. Three months 
after the morning when I warned him of the wrath of 
God Almighty he died. On that day the funeral pyre was 
raised for him, the Yetties applied the torch, and stood at 
a distance while fire consumed his mortal remains. 

The tidings went over the country that the persecutor 
was dead. Yetties told the story wherever they went. 
The Christians lifted up their heads and said, "Our God 
is a God who hears our cries.*' The caste people talked 
of it to each other and wondered. The village officials 
here and there decided that perhaps, after all, it might 
be well to treat the Christians kindly. All felt that the 
God of the Christians had spoken. The effect was pro- 
nounced and lasting. 

My tour convinced me that I had no cause to fear for 
that movement. I had gone over much of the ground 
and had found warm hearts and strong faith. All were 
at work. The village elders were in their places. The 
schools were doing good work. The preachers were full 
of zeal. Persecution had been borne. The weight of it 
had rested on us all. Not a voice was raised in favor of 
compromise. Standing for Jesus Christ and the new life 
was worth all it cost. 



XIX 

AN EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 

A MONTH after I returned from my extended tour over 
the field I wrote a decisive letter to the Executive Com- 
mittee, in which I proposed the division of the Ongole 
field. During the tour, and in thinking it over afterwards, 
I had become deeply impressed with the overwhelming 
call for work which ought to be done everywhere. We 
had labored strenuously during the two months of tour- 
ing, yet had passed through only five of the nine or ten 
taluks over which the movement had spread. Later in 
the year Dr. and Mrs. Boggs made a tour of one month. 
They found warm hearts and open minds everywhere. 
Nearly 600 were baptized during their tour. 

The size of the Ongole field was unwieldy. It ex- 
tended ninety miles north and south, and one hundred 
miles east and west. There were probably two million 
people in this area, living in two thousand towns and vil- 
lages, more or less. The movement had had a wide 
sweep. The Ongole methods had had a chance to work 
themselves out. Most of our Christians knew little of 
other missionary societies or other methods. Beyond the 
confines of the Ongole field missionaries of two societies 
from England and one society from America were at 
work. In several places their boundaries and ours over- 
lapped. Their converts were not from the Madigas. 

I realized, in deciding this question, that the day of 

326 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 327 

pioneers was now over. We men of the early years 
could find ourselves so buried in heathenism that we had 
to look for our nearest missionary neighbor fifty or one 
hundred miles away. A different day had come. New 
societies were being founded. The old societies were 
sending strong reenforcements. New ideas were gaining 
ground about the amount of careful labor which should 
extend from the mission stations over the surrounding 
country. The South India Missionary Conference had 
discussed this question. A consensus of opinion had been 
reached that no mission field should extend further than 
thirty miles from its headquarters. I could see the jus- 
tice in this trend of opinion in mission affairs, and was 
ready to adapt myself to it. 

Since the time of the ingathering I had often realized 
that there was an element of instability in the Ongole 
movement so long as a large part of the responsibility 
lay on the shoulders of one man. If an accident were 
to happen to me, or my health were to break down, who 
would be willing to take my place ? I had to tell myself 
that willingness and capacity were not the only requisites 
in this case. The movement and I were as one organism. 
I sought counsel with my fellow-missionaries. All were 
convinced that I must divide the field, and do it soon, 
letting the division take a normal course and thus pre- 
vent disaster. 

My proposition to the Executive Committee therefore 
was that several of the outlying taluks were to be made 
independent mission fields without delay. The mission- 
ary in each case was to erect a bungalow in the taluk 
town and thus be within easy access of the thousands of 
Christians in the taluk. Dr. Boggs, who had been asso- 
ciated with me at Ongole for over a year, was willing to 
take charge of the Cumbum and Markapur taluks, which 
from the first had formed an important center of the 



328 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

movement. We requested that other men be sent. Of 
the nine or ten taluks included in the Ongole field four 
or five of those farthest from Ongole were to be estab- 
lished as separate fields as soon as practicable. 

These plans were good, but for the time being they 
came to naught. The reason was that I had moved 
away from the beaten track with my methods. The 
report was spreading that a man who came to Ongole 
must work by Ongole methods. Men at that time were 
not always willing to do this. Those methods had 
not then stood the test of experience. They seemed to 
many due to my personality, and my manner of working. 
I could not adequately explain the situation to anyone. 
There were times when I took the shortest line between 
two given points, and knew my reasons for doing it. 
But how to make them clear to the next man was another 
question. Some of my methods were not of my making ; 
circumstances had forced them upon me. To some I 
had adapted myself willingly; they went along the line 
of least resistance and were sensible. About others I 
had doubts. They stood for a course which I had found 
the best possible under prevailing conditions. I had 
always sought guidance from Jesus, and believed that he 
was in these methods. 

I did everything in my power to help the men who 
came after me. I took them touring with me. I an- 
swered their questions. I explained to them conditions 
which are difficult to grasp except after years of experi- 
ence in the country. I had myself gone through a severe 
apprenticeship when I began work in Ongole. Thrown 
upon my own resources, I had learned to look to God for 
guidance and to go ahead. No doubt pioneer habits 
were strong upon me. We men of the old days had our 
own way of working. It became a question with the 
younger men who clustered about us whether they would 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 329 

walk in the track we had hewn. That movement among 
the Madigas had given me a training which I could share 
with no other man, no matter how willing I might be to 
do so. Moreover, I had a place in the hearts of those 
Madigas which I could neither give nor bequeath to any- 
one else. No matter how loyal they might learn to be to 
the next man, they never ceased to speak of me as the 
''pedda Dhora" — the big or elder Dhora: — with a peculiar 
affection. It was not in my power to alter this state of 
affairs. My successors had to make the best of it. 

In later years, fellow-missionaries have told me they 
wished I had taken them more into my confidence in the 
early days and explained to them more fully how I was 
trying to let the Madigas remain in their own groove, 
while they were slowly growing into the forms of a re- 
ligion that had been brought to them from the West. I 
was not aware of having withheld anything from them. 
I did not see it plainly myself in the early days. When 
we are in the midst of anything we can seldom formulate 
all our reasons for a given course of action. It is in 
after years that we see our motives clearly. But if I had 
told my successors to how great an extent several of the 
leaders among our preachers were responsible for the 
Ongole methods, it would have filled their minds with 
doubt about those methods at the outset. Moreover, they 
would have raised a contention with me regarding the 
organization of churches. They would have told me 
that the gospel was adapted out and out to all races and 
climes, and that as the organized, self-sustaining Chris- 
tian church was part of the gospel, it also was adapted 
to all places without distinction. Afterwards, in looking 
back, they saw it more clearly, and so did I; for the 
trend of the times had come to help us. 

The tendency of that whole situation at Ongole was 
always in the direction of leaving the burden of work 



330 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

and responsibility on me. Year after year I carried a 
heavy load. At this juncture, in 1880, the result was 
that the division of the field was postponed. The growth 
did not cease, neither in numbers nor in active Christian 
life. I looked to the Lord Jesus to help me, and he did 
not fail me. 

The year 1880 was a decisive year in our history at 
Ongole. Projects which had been maturing for years 
now came to completion. One of these was a high school 
for our Christian community. It could no longer be 
said that the Madigas of that region were an illiterate 
people. The number of our village schools scattered 
over the field had recently grown to nearly 150, with 
more than 2,000 pupils. Some of these schools were 
very elementary, taught under a tree by a teacher who 
could barely read and write. Others had reached a fair 
degree of efficiency, and were taught by recent seminary 
graduates. We had our large station schools at Ongole, 
with 300 pupils. Our best men and women were sent 
to our theological seminary. But that whole educational 
scheme was unfinished without a high school. After 
much correspondence with the home board, funds suf- 
ficient were at our disposal. We made a beginning in 
May, 1880, with one hundred students, of whom twenty- 
seven were Christian lads. 

All our schools were under the supervision of the edu- 
cational department of the government in Madras. A 
substantial grant-in-aid was secured. Our high school 
was also to come under this system. It was to be open 
to Christians, Hindus and Mohammedans alike. From 
the beginning we had Christian teachers on the staff, and 
the Bible was taught to all an hour each day. An in- 
creasing number of Brahman boys came. They knew 
when they entered that they would sit on the same 
benches with our Christian boys, and raised no objec- 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 33 1 

tions. But they considered the highest class their own. 
When now a Christian was ready to enter it they rose in 
protest. They left the school in a body, and took nearly 
all the non-Ghristian boys with them. It soon became 
apparent to them that this made no difference to anyone. 
The school continued without them. They came back. 
This meant a long stride in proving that the day of 
Pariah degradation was over. Education formed a 
bridge that connected Brahman and Pariah. Rev. W. R. 
Manley became principal of the school, and tided it over 
the difficulties of its first seven years. Those who had 
doubted whether the Madigas had the capacity to receive 
an education were forced to admit that it was within 
their power. 

I had opposition to face in opening this high school, 
both in America and in India. Some said it was prema- 
ture, because we had not a sufficient number of boys in 
our Telugu Mission ready to enter and thus justify the es- 
tablishment of such a school. This objection was over- 
come after a few years. Then there was always the con- 
tention that it was not a legitimate use of mission money 
to educate orientals, who afterwards were sometimes 
known to use their education in a way hostile to Chris- 
tianity. I always felt that this was a minor consideration. 
I was not at any time influenced by discussions on this 
subject. I could see only one side to the whole question. 
Unmoved by any opposition, whether from Hindus or 
from the men of my own race, I forged ahead. I was 
bound to see an educated Christian community in my day. 
To some extent I succeeded in this. 

There was another important direction in which I 
made a move in 1880, and by force of contrast it is the 
more remarkable that in this I had no opposition to face. 
Everyone looked upon it as the right move. We now 
took the first step toward the organization of separate 



332 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

churches. The ground was unbroken in this respect. 

The Baptist church at Ongole, organized with eight 
members January i, 1867, was the church into which 
we had received more than 15,000 members. There 
were no other churches on the Ongole field. We had 
seven ordained native preachers. In a natural way it 
had come to pass, in the course of the years, that Chris- 
tian centers of development were formed here and there 
on the field. We now had more than thirty of these. In 
each one of them there was a man who practically per- 
formed the functions of a pastor. The men had grown 
with the centers. Together they had formed the con- 
tinuity of the movement. The only course now open to 
us was to organize these centers into churches, and to 
ordain the leading men in them as Christian ministers. 

These were the men who had stood together as a 
group of leaders from the beginning of the movement. 
Humble men in their walks in life, God had honored 
them. In the social uprising of their people in the months 
of famine, and in the days of the ingathering, these men 
had stood shoulder to shoulder with me. They had looked 
forward to their ordination. Our Christians took a deep 
interest in the events that were now to take place. They 
wanted nothing changed in the relations sustained be- 
tween themselves and their preachers. But if it was in 
accordance with the rules of the Christian religion that 
they should pass through an examination, and, if found 
worthy, receive the Christian ordination, they felt that 
it was all as it should be. They tried to learn what it 
meant, and to harrtionize it with ideas of religious prac- 
tices familiar and congenial to them in their Indian life. 

In response to a call from the Ongole Church a council 
convened at Ongole April 14-16, 1880, to consider the 
propriety of formally setting apart to the work of the 
gospel ministry those native preachers whose labors had 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 333 

already been crowned with so much success. Dr. Downie 
came from Nellore and Dr. Williams from Ramapatnam 
with delegates from both stations. The council was or- 
ganized; the examination was close and deliberate and 
occupied two days and a half. Dr. Boggs reported about 
this examination : 

"It embraced as usual the important points of conver- 
sion, and call to the ministry, and an outline of Christian 
doctrine; many testing questions were asked both by the 
missionaries and native delegates and the answers were 
generally very satisfactory. Their knowledge of the Chris- 
tian system seemed surprising, especially after hearing each 
one of them, in relating his experience, speak of the time, 
only a few years back, when they were worshiping idols. 
The result was that twenty- four of the best, most experi- 
enced, and successful preachers connected with the Ongole 
Mission were considered worthy of the confidence implied 
in this act of public recognition." 

Dr. Downie preached the ordination sermon, and Dr. 
Williams delivered an earnest charge both to the church 
and the candidates. Then the twenty-four all knelt, and 
the hands of the leading ministers were laid on them 
while the ordaining prayer was offered by Rev. N. Kana- 
kiah of Nellore. The benediction was pronounced by 
Yerraguntla Periah, the oldest man among those just 
ordained, and the firstfruits of them all. 

It was an unusual occasion. Not often in the history 
of modern missions have twenty-four men been ordained 
to the ministry at the same time. Theological schools of 
learning had had little to do with the making of most of 
these men. Only a few of the twenty-four were gradu- 
ates of the Ramapatnam Seminary. The rest had been 
taught by me during the six weeks of the preachers' in- 
stitute, held every hot season during the early years in 



334 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

Ongole. And on me also theological schools had not had 
an opportunity to leave their mark. Thus we all were off 
the beaten track of ecclesiastical proceedings. We had 
worked together and the Lord Jesus had blessed our 
labors. Their ordination was not the door to their min- 
istry. It was the other way. Their ministry demanded 
recognition through ordination. 

The first step had been taken. Six months later we 
were facing the next step. Letters had been coming to 
me from the larger groups of members here and there 
over the field, who wished to form separate churches with 
their own pastors. The Ramapatnam Seminary had 
done its work in preparing the way for this. Dr. Wil- 
liams had realized what was needed, and had worked to 
meet the need. He and his assistant teachers had drilled 
successive classes of students on the subject of the New 
Testament church and its ordinances. What was taught 
in the seminary found its way into receptive minds all 
over the field. They wanted their own churches. They 
wrote to me and signed long lists of names to their let- 
ters. A package of them is still among my papers. 

One of our large quarterly meetings came, just six 
months after the ordination of the twenty-four. On Sun- 
day, October lo, 1880, I preached from Psalm 48:14 — 
"This God is our God forever and ever; he will be our 
guide unto death." Dr. Boggs was then still associated 
with me at Ongole, and Mr. Manley also assisted. We 
went through all the hard work which these quarterly 
meetings always brought. Then, October 13, we gave 
our whole attention to a lengthy inquiry concerning the 
setting off of twenty-six churches. 

There were present at that deliberation in the chapel 
the representative members of the Ongole Church from 
all portions of its field. We had on the table before us 
the applications of the various groups of members, re- 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 335 

questing dismissal from the parent church in order to 
form independent churches. The Ongole Church, repre- 
sented by its leading members, was ready to vote on this 
subject. It is true the Ongole Church now numbered 
14,872, and there was no way of obtaining the vote of 
even one tenth of the membership. But we had their 
leaders there with us in the chapel. There were thirty- 
three ordained preachers and thirty unordained. There 
were nearly one hundred and fifty village school teachers ; 
there were several hundred deacons, and there were other 
members who had come from here and there. No one 
could say that we missionaries had done this work with- 
out the cooperation of the native church. We tried to 
adhere strictly to New Testament methods. 

It was only a partial solution of the question of or- 
ganization. We dismissed only 2,000 members out of 
our total of nearly 15,000 — less than one-seventh. 
But it was a beginning. We now taught them Bap- 
tist church autonomy. They could receive members 
by baptism, they could exercise church discipline. They 
bought a plate and a cup in the bazaar for their com- 
munion service; they bought a bell to call their mem- 
bers together. We gave to each a book with the names 
of their members recorded. It was a very rudimen- 
tary attempt at church organization. Those special con- 
ceptions of the church which belong to our own race 
did not appeal to them because they knew nothing of their 
history. They lacked the range of ideas that would have 
helped to give an intelligent hold upon those distinctly 
Christian conceptions. Much of the most valuable acqui- 
sition of Christian thought was inaccessible to them. 

The people understood that they must support their 
preacher and their teacher. There would have been a 
great deal of willingness among them to do this if it had 
not been for their poverty. Recently emerged from a 



33^ SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

fearful famine, they had little themselves. Many a fam- 
ily among the Christians had barely enough to go around 
for one meal a day. To help feed the preacher and 
teacher from this meant stinting themselves till it hurt. 

Those preachers, capable and faithful though they were 
in their appointed places, were unwilling to cut loose 
from their organic connection with headquarters. They 
felt they could not stand alone without the advice, the 
help and the backing which the missionary could give 
them. The impetus of the movement was still on us. 
We could not split ourselves into separate units. The 
cohesion of the movement was organic, the ideal of the 
Western church was in this case artificial. 

Thus, while those ordained preachers had their homes 
in the villages where the new churches had been or- 
ganized, they still remained responsible for the groups 
of villages which constituted their little field. This ne- 
cessitated frequent absence from their homes, while in a 
number of cases their wives kept up the services on Sun- 
day and taught school during the week. For their pas- 
toral work they received pay, generally in kind, from 
their members. For their evangelistic work they still 
considered themselves under my direction, and depended 
on the mission for their quarterly allowance. To many 
of them the actual purchasing value of the few rupees 
put into their hands was of slight importance as 
compared to the prestige it gave them to be still con- 
nected with our Ongole Mission. They could not forego 
the stimulating effect of the quarterly meeting at Ongole, 
which was calculated in those days to wind up everyone 
for renewed effort for another three months. 

The quarterly meetings of those days played a great 
part in the movement. They had grown to these large 
proportions from a small beginning. Away back in the 
early days Yerraguntla Periah and I agreed that it would 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 337 

be well for him to come to Ongole every month if pos- 
sible for the communion service, and to confer with me 
about the work. As the band of workers grew they, too, 
came. Converts came with them for baptism. My con- 
nection with the staff of workers was kept active and 
dominant by these monthly meetings. As the size of the 
field increased, the monthly meetings grew unwieldy. The 
workers had to walk long distances back and forth. We 
were scarcely through the work of one meeting when 
another was at hand. Even before the famine we had to 
make it a bimonthly gathering, and then it became quar- 
terly. 

In those days, while we were yet all together, and di- 
visions were only being planned, these meetings were 
occasions to which we all looked forward. Preachers, 
teachers, both men and women, helpers, and many of 
the more prominent members came flocking into Ongole 
in groups from every portion of the more than 7,000 
square miles of the field. The compound began to fill 
on Saturday afternoon. They stood together, dusty and 
footsore from walking seventy miles in some cases, and 
exchanged greetings. To the recognized staff among 
them I had to extend the hospitality of the compound; 
for I had asked them to come that we might jointly trans- 
act the business of the mission. Our first meeting always 
occurred on a Saturday, toward evening. The list was 
read and each received an allowance of a small silver coin 
per day, the equivalent of about five cents. Each family 
was given an earthen pot from a big pile of pots stacked 
ready near by. In the cold season we gave mats to lie 
on. As night fell there were little campfires all over the 
compound, and groups around them waiting for the rice 
and curry that was under preparation, and there was 
much talking and relating experiences of the past months. 

On Sunday morning it was my custom to preach 



338 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

a carefully prepared sermon to the 700 people or 
more who filled the chapel to overflowing. I knew 
that all the workers were waiting for points which they 
could take and tell over the field during the following 
months. My quarterly meeting sermon filled a need, and 
unless it was an hour or more in length my men were not 
satisfied. Then came communion service. After a few 
hours of rest we examined the several hundred candi- 
dates who usually were brought from the field for bap- 
tism. We closed the day under the tamarind tree in our 
garden by the baptistery, where each preacher baptized 
those who came from his field. 

The following days of the quarterly meeting were full 
of hard work. There were payments to make. Twice a 
year we gave to each worker on our list a suit of clothes, 
because I found that it was well to conform to the native 
custom of payment in kind and not in money. Besides, 
the white suit, which cost less than one dollar, was the 
same for all and thus constituted a kind of uniform, 
which I found had its uses. We gave them tracts to 
distribute on the field, and medicines for their house- 
holds, since they were far from medical aid away off in 
the jungle. Above all, we gave them counsel and en- 
couragement, and words of commendation where in 
place. The preachers made known to me any difficulties 
on their fields. School matters were adjusted with the 
teachers. Cases of distress were given a hearing, and 
relieved if possible. 

I gave myself wholly to the people during those days. 
When all were satisfied, and I had prayed with them and 
committed us all to the Lord Jesus and his care and 
guidance, I sent them on their way home. And then I 
was a tired man. 'Tnvincibles,'* as I called them — people 
with unreasonable requests — generally stayed behind to 
see what they could get from me. But I withdrew into 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 339 

my room, closed the doors, and rested under the punkah. 
Some one among the preachers, even at ordinary times, 
was always at hand to keep those in check who could 
never be satisfied. They used to say to such: "Our 
Dhora now has given all his strength to the people. If 
you kill him what good can that do you? Go home and 
tell your troubles to God only ; for our Dhora is bent over 
with the load which the people have laid upon him." It 
generally took me several days to rebound after one of 
these quarterly meetings. 

I loved the people and let them feel it. There was no 
ecclesiastical dignity about me. Warmth was what they 
wanted. I went about among them and slapped one man 
a little on the shoulder, another I shook a little, with the 
next I had a bit of pleasantry, next I mimicked some one, 
around my most trusted men I put my arm and asked 
them what they had been doing. It made them happy. I 
learned this through Yerraguntla Periah in the early 
days. He had come in as usual, but went about with a 
sad, downcast face. Mrs. Clough finally asked him 
whether anything was troubling him. He replied, *'l 
fear our Dhora does not love me any more. Since I came 
several days ago he has not once slapped my shoulder, or 
shaken me, or put his arm around me, or made fun with 
me. I am very sad." Of course Mrs. Clough lost no 
time in telling me about this, and I made up to him for 
all my neglect. It was an eye-opener to me, and showed 
me that they prized above everything else the little indi- 
cations that I was getting near to them, as man to man. 

It seems these traits of personality were part of my 
equipment for the work. I may not always have been 
wise in giving free play to my sense of humor, but the 
people loved me for it, because it brought me near to 
them. I often did a bit of acting and could imitate their 
voices and their ways of doing things. They thought 



340 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

it great. If something they had done, or were doing, 
made me angry, and I scathed them with sharp reproof, 
it was an item of interest on the field. By the degree of 
my anger the people gauged the serious nature of the 
offense, and all took notice. 

My physical endurance during those years held out 
notwithstanding climate and work. I could stand on my 
veranda all morning and take up the case of one deputa- 
tion after another from villages far and near. They sat 
under the trees in front of my veranda sometimes sev- 
eral days before their turn came, and did it patiently; 
for nothing would satisfy them unless they had a hearing 
from me personally. I was always surrounded by a 
band of men and women who did preliminary work with 
the people, and told me in a few simple words what was 
wanted, making long inquiries unnecessary. Generally 
the requests were legitimate ; it concerned their preacher 
or their school, or there was a persecution, or the Chris- 
tians in the village were quarreling, or there was a griev- 
ous case of poverty, sickness or death. 

Sometimes I rebelled ; I told the people they were heap- 
ing their burdens upon me unjustly. If their Sudra 
masters scolded them, if they had a little pain in their 
limbs — I used to tell them — they rose up and said, "Let 
us go to Ongole and tell our Clough Dhora." For such I 
had little welcome. On the other hand, I made it a rule 
never to let anyone feel that he had nothing more to do 
with me. No matter how I had rebuked a man, or how 
sharply I had protested against his doings, I always found 
a bridge between that man and myself, even if it was 
only a bit of humor and nonsense. Thus I held the 
Christians together, and kept in touch with the adherents 
and caste people. 

The friends of the Ongole Mission, especially those in 
America, often feared that since there were no organized 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 34 1 

churches on our field, the movement was lacking in en- 
during qualities. There was no cause for fear. It was 
not a movement without organization. The men who 
were closest to the people were our deacons, the village 
elders of former days, then came the teachers, men and 
women, the Bible women and preachers, and finally I 
was always there, accessible to the highest and to the 
lowest. Moreover, according to the New Testament 
conception of the church, the whole field was dotted with 
churches ; for there were groups of believers everywhere, 
who were "steadfast in their faith in Jesus," and to 
whom "the Lord added such as should be saved." The 
spiritual life on the field was not essentially affected, or 
increased in vigor, by that mass ordination and the set- 
ting apart of twenty-six churches. It merely brought the 
Christians more into conformity with the church of 
Christ and its ordinances. 

I used to talk sometimes of "paper churches." To 
have it all down on paper, ready for statistical tables : so 
many members, deacons, baptisms, contributions — all this 
does not constitute a church. On the other hand, a 
group of believers, full of love for the Lord Jesus and 
good works in their own oriental way, seemed to me in 
many cases all we could expect in the way of a church for 
the time being. 

This attempt at organization would have been far more 
effective if it had been made before the famine and in- 
gathering came upon us. If that theological seminary 
had been given to us when I first began to plead for it, 
soon after we settled in Ongole, those valuable ten years 
would not have been lost, so far as church organization 
was concerned. But it is possible that this was not in 
the divine plan. 

It may have been well that, with Mrs. Clough to help 
me, I had to train the preachers myself, who formed my 



342 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

corps of workers during famine and ingathering. May- 
be that was what God wanted. There was a complete 
understanding between them and me. I knew what to 
expect of each. They knew me, and knew to what ex- 
tent I would stand by them through thick and thin. I 
must say there was no lack of loyalty on their part. 
There were times when they showed by their actions that 
they were willing to pluck out their eyes and give them to 
me. They showed their devotion in all sorts of ways. If 
I had rivers to ford they took me on their shoulders and 
put me on my feet on the other side entirely dry. If I 
was hungry out on tour they declined to eat until they 
knew that I had had my portion. Often they put them- 
selves between me and angry people and refused to leave 
until they knew I was safe. This mutual loyalty formed 
the esprit de corps of the movement. We were able thus 
to hold together and work as one man when the strain 
and stress of a great emergency came upon us. 

Perhaps, too, it simplified matters when the ingather- 
ing came that we could baptize the ten thousand converts 
into the Ongole Church. If at that time there had been 
a number of self-sustaining churches over my field, I 
doubt whether I could have handled the situation. The 
firm grip which the preachers and I had on it would have 
weakened ; there would have been a splitting up of inter- 
ests. Perhaps, from that point of view, it was necessary 
that the organizing of churches should suffer in order 
that the movement might prosper. 

One drawback was that the preachers had before them 
no pattern of a self-governing, self-supporting church. 
They watched me narrowly in all my dealings in the 
Ongole Baptist Church as its pastor, and they copied me. 
But I also had the supervision of the whole field. It was 
not possible always to keep the two offices distinct. The 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 343 

ideas of the preachers about the functions of a pastor 
must thereby have become confused at some points. 

In my whole attempt to organize Baptist churches 
among the Madigas the feature which I can pronounce an 
unquaHfied success was the village elder turned into a 
Baptist deacon. Whenever in a Madiga village one or 
more of the headmen were converted I considered the 
battle half won. I only needed to utilize their position 
in the community, and bring it into service for the Lord 
Jesus and keep it there, and I had their customs, handed 
down from time immemorial, to help us. I always leaned 
on these headmen, and held as closely to their own ideas 
as I could consistently. To force a lot of Western ideas 
upon such a converted village elder was not to my mind 
good policy. I let him stay in his groove, and let him 
learn in his own way how to lead a Christian life and 
help others to do the same. 

The next step was that all the five headmen of a 
Madiga village were converted, and thus the village 
council which they formed — the panchayat — ^became 
Christianized as a matter of course. There I saw my 
opportunity; for along this line I could introduce church 
organization according to strictly Indian customs and 
ideas. I wanted to become a lawyer and politician in my 
early life. It must be that with my latent capacity in 
that direction I promptly seized upon the crude legal 
aspects of the Madiga village, and created out of them 
new conditions, giving the people the Christian ethical 
code, and teaching them to love and serve the Lord 
Jesus. 

The duties of the village panchayat were easily ad- 
justed to the new Christian communal life. Those five 
village elders, in the old days, had to see to the upkeep 
of the village worship; they could levy fines for light of- 
fenses; it was in their power to expel a man from the 



344 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

community for a grave offense. A stranger coming to 
the village went to the headmen, and in cases of distress 
they had to find means of relief. Often the panchayat 
was as depraved as the men who composed it; yet here 
was a system of self-government that only needed to be 
utilized for Christian propaganda. I was not slow to do 
this. 

All through the years I had had my eye on the compe- 
tent village elders. 1 put them to work and called them 
my "helpers" and let them know that I leaned on them. 
They formed a large unpaid staff of mission workers, an 
organic part of the whole, working hand in hand with 
the preachers and forming the solid foundation of the 
structure. And now, after the ingathering, these men 
began to come to the front. They wanted recognition. 
If the preachers were to be ordained, the centers of 
Christian activity to be organized as churches, then where 
were they to come in? Under the old order they had 
been content and asked for nothing. Under the new 
order they wanted their names put down on some list, 
to show they had not been left out. 

My diary contains the first mention of those six months 
after the ingathering. By the end of 1879 there were 
thirty on the list, by the end of 1880 the number had 
grown to two hundred and thirty. At the quarterly meet- 
ing in October, 1880, this movement of deacons came 
upon us in a way to perplex us. I knew that a large 
number of them had come to Ongole. I agreed to meet 
them and hear their requests and deliberate with them 
after the work of setting apart the twenty-six churches 
had been accomplished. When the time came Dr. Boggs 
and I were overwhelmed by the number and the persis- 
tency of the applicants. I knew many of them per- 
sonally. I had been in their villages, and knew that, for 
Madigas, they were men of means. If, then, the small 



EASTERN PEOPLE AND WESTERN ORGANIZATION 345 

allowance for which they asked did not form a motive, 
what actuated them? 

I called a council of the oldest and most reliable preach- 
ers and asked them the meaning of this movement of 
village elders. They made themselves spokesmen for the 
elders, and told me they had encouraged them to come; 
for they feared that under the new order of things they 
might become discouraged and cease to be the pillars of 
support which they had been in the past. I asked what 
would be done if I withheld the allowance which these 
men wanted. The preachers replied without hesitation 
that it would make no difference. They reminded me, 
however, that if the elders received half a rupee — fifteen 
cents — way allowance, when coming to the quarterly 
meeting, and the same when they returned home, that 
all the village people would see thereby that their going 
to Ongole was not idle pastime, but that they were really 
needed there as representatives of the Christian villages. 
They also pointed out to me that if they were given a 
cloth twice a year costing very little, with the rest of the 
staff of workers, it would be in accordance with the cus- 
tom of the country. The Sudra master, when he wants 
the Madiga to know that he is his man, gives him a cloth. 
If the elders were thus recognized by the mission it 
would be evidence to everyone that they were acceptable 
servants to the mission, and their word would be re- 
spected. I knew that the preachers were right about this. 

This movement of the village elders was very signifi- 
cant. They had been a contented, capable force of work- 
ers during all the years. Only the most prominent among 
them were now asking recognition. There were hun- 
dreds of them on the field. No one had questioned their 
position and it was without pay. Now this was all upset 
by our attempt to introduce church organization, which, 
though not far-reaching, was yet a blow at the old order 



34^ SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

of things. A sort of rebellion broke out among them. 
If their old rights were to suffer interference, they 
wanted new rights. The preachers feared the disorgani- 
zation of all their work if these rights were not granted. 
I now understood the situation, and tried to meet the 
emergency. It was another instance of how the move- 
ment among the Madigas forced methods upon me 
which I could not easily explain to those who came after 
me. For some years thereafter we had a long list of 
"helpers." They were the really self-supporting force of 
the mission. It was only after the mission became more 
and more organized that their services were no longer 
considered essential. Their names were then gradually 
taken off the list of workers. 

I have been asked to state at the close of this chapter 
what I now think of that whole attempt at church or- 
ganization. It is possible for me to say in the retrospect 
what I would not have cared to say thirty years ago. At 
that time the whole trend of opinion in the Christian 
world would have been against me. But now I say with- 
out hesitation: The Western forms of Christianity are 
not necessarily adapted to an Eastern community. There 
were years when I tried to lead the people toward West- 
ern organization; for I wanted them to grow into it. I 
even tried, since pressure was being brought to bear upon 
me from outside, to force it upon them. I was only par- 
tially successful. In so far as I could make use of the 
primitive self -administration of the Indian village com- 
munity, in so far did I succeed. 

I am glad, as I look back, that my efforts were mostly 
in the direction of preaching Jesus in a way which ap- 
pealed to the oriental mind, and that I gave to church or- 
ganization, according to Western ideas, a secondary place. 
It seems to me I was in line with the New Testament 
church, and that God was guiding and helping me. 



XX 

SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 

I WAS waiting for reen for cement from America. Six 
months after the ingathering Dr. Boggs had come out to 
help me. He had been associated with me for two years, 
and had borne with me the heavy cares of those years. 
Then he was called to the theological seminary at Rama- 
patnam during the temporary absence of Dr. Williams. 
The claim of the 200 students in that institution was 
recognized by us all. It was taken for granted that 
I could somehow hold the fort alone. 

I had been asked repeatedly to write a book about the 
Telugu revival. The people at home wanted something 
that would bring them into close touch with this move- 
ment. They had had nothing but missionary reports thus 
far. I saw that a story from real life was wanted. The 
only time which I could spare for such work was the hot 
season, when the heat kept everyone at home. Accord- 
ingly, when, in the summer of 1881, the hot winds began 
to blow, my time for writing had come. The bungalow 
was cooled by mats of fragrant roots, kept moist all day 
by a coolie who continuously poured water over them. 
The punkahs were swinging overhead. The hero and 
heroine and other leading characters in the story were 
now at Ongole, always within call, ready to tell me not 
only their own experiences, but also the customs and cere- 
monies pertaining to life in the Indian village. 

347 



348 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

I wrote many hours each day. My book was finished 
in six weeks. I gave it the title "From Darkness to 
Light." The sale was said to be remarkable for a mis- 
sionary book. I enjoyed this work. When it was done 
I felt tempted to go on using my pen and spin out another 
story. But scarcely was my conclusion written when a 
quarterly meeting came upon me. After that was over 
my diary for the first time records symptoms of over- 
work: "Tired out, nerves unstrung, and feel so weak 
that I can hardly walk and cannot eat.'* 

Again several months passed by in waiting. My diary 
has entries about urgent appeals sent home for reenforce- 
ment. Now and then there is a hint of deep discourage- 
ment, because there was no one in sight to relieve me. 
This could not go on indefinitely. Since my last return 
from furlough, early in 1874, I had been at my post 
without a break except the three months when I took my 
family as far as England on their way home. The let- 
ters from Mrs. Clough and the children were full of 
disappointment over the prolonged absence. At last, in 
October, 1881, we heard that two new men were to sail 
in a few days, and four were to follow soon after. Two 
of our older missionaries were returning from furlough. 
Of these eight men, four were to take portions of the On- 
gole field. The other three were to fill vacancies in other 
stations of the mission. We all took courage. 

The new men came, and began their work by learning 
the Telugu language. I took them out on tour with me, 
and let them see the field, and become acquainted with 
my methods. The Ongole field had covered ten taluks. 
The four that were farthest from Ongole were now to 
be made separate mission stations. They were Cumbum, 
Bapatla, Vinukonda and Narsaravupet. The Ongole 
church voted to give letters of dismissal to the members 
living in those four taluks. We could not give a letter 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 349 

to each of the 8,000 members whom we thus dismissed. 
We dealt with large groups. The parent church had 
14,000 members left. All the workers belonging to 
each taluk went with their new missionaries. Some of 
the strongest of our preachers were working at the 
outposts. I did not like to let them go, but, on the other 
hand, I was glad they were there to help carry forward 
the work under changed conditions. 

I now felt that since the most necessary provision had 
been made I could leave my work for a time. I sailed 
for America toward the end of 1883. During this fur- 
lough at home I traveled much, and told the story of the 
Telugu revival in many churches to large audiences. I 
collected money for mission property, and turned the at- 
tention of many people in the direction of our Telugu 
Mission. My furlough was cut short somewhat by the 
serious illness and death of the missionary and his wife 
whom I had left in charge at Ongole, caring for the work 
there. My presence was required. I returned to India in 
the fall of 1884. 

The men who had taken portions of the old Ongole 
field and made them independent stations had found their 
bearings and had looked over their resources. One of 
them reported : "The great revival is still going on. We 
have no trouble in getting converts ; the only trouble is to 
train them." Another wrote : "I have no fear about the 
future ingathering of converts. That work has gained 
such an impetus that it will go on independently of the 
missionary. The urgent, pressing need is for more pas- 
toral care, more biblical instruction, and more Christian 
primary education for the children." 

Those who had pushed their outposts toward the north 
encountered "the Ongole wave" of revival in parts of the 
Telugu country remote from Ongole. A missionary who 
settled in a hard, new field south of us reported that for 



350 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

forty miles in three directions from his station not a 
Christian was to be found anywhere. In the fourth di- 
rection, as he approached the confines of the Ongole field, 
there were whole villages of Christians. So far as the 
movement toward Christianity was concerned it was 
going ahead; there was no sign of any decrease in its 
inherent force. But the training of the converts, which 
was already so serious a question, was rendered still more 
serious by the lack of means with which to forge ahead. 

It was during those years that great prominence began 
to be given to the question of self-support in foreign 
missions. Most of the missionary societies were facing 
serious deficits at the close of every financial year. The 
demands of the mission fields were increasing. Students 
of missions who were in close touch with the problems of 
the situation pointed to the necessity of making the native 
churches self-sustaining, and thought they had herein 
found the solution of the whole difficulty. The attempts 
of the missionary boards to bring this about by stringent 
measures fell as a deadweight upon their missionaries. 

We men out on the foreign field had taken our own 
course of development, and the results were now being 
scrutinized. We had cultivated new ground. As a mat- 
ter of course, we could not carry the religion of Jesus 
Christ to non-Christian races, unaccompanied by the 
philanthropic activities which are a part of it. We white 
men became the friends of those who needed us ; we edu- 
cated their children; we built hospitals for the sick; we 
saved them from death when starving. We did it mostly 
with foreign money; our spiritual instruction and our 
deeds of benevolence went hand in hand. In doing this 
were we on the wrong track? Did we fail to foster a 
hardy, self-reliant growth in our converts? Was the 
Christian community in Asia being pauperized by means 
of money given by the home churches ? 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 351 

During all the years since then this question has been 
discussed by the younger men. We pioneers undoubtedly 
have passed serious problems on to them. Perhaps they 
are right in feeling that if we had laid the foundations 
differently; if we had insisted on self-help among the 
native Christians from the beginning, the burdens of our 
successors would be less heavy. I know that I am one of 
the men of the old days who was called "a father of the 
poor." It seems to me, in the light of my experience, 
that if I stood again at the beginning of the work in 
Ongole, I should take the same course right over again. 
It was not possible in the early days of the movement to 
foresee any undesirable consequences in my policy of 
helping the people. There was so much love and Chris- 
tian spirit abroad among our early Christians that very 
little of a grasping disposition appeared on the surface. 
Later on, I must admit, this appeared more and more. 
I worked hard then to suppress it, but not always and in 
every direction with success. 

There were some things which I could not do, and 
which no amount of outside pressure could make me do. 
One of these was to preach to a crowd of hungry people. 
If the people of a village came to hear me, and I knew by 
their looks, as they stood or sat before me, that they had 
not had a square meal for days and weeks, I found I 
could not talk to them about the love of Jesus for them. 
I sent them off with a few coins first and told them to 
eat and then come back and hear my message. Some- 
times younger missionaries remonstrated with me. They 
said I was making paupers of the people. To such I said, 
"Were you ever hungry, brother? Well, these people 
are hungry, and I know what it means to be hungry, and 
I am not going to let these people suffer if I can help it." 
If I went too far in this I cannot say that I now regret 



352 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

it. I was only obeying the command, "Be ye merciful, 
even as your Father in heaven is merciful." 

This might have been less pronounced in me if I had 
not endured poverty during our pioneering days in Amer- 
ica. It was hard schooling when, as a boy, during 
a winter on the western prairies, my mother had nothing 
to give me to eat but porridge and potatoes, and not 
enough of that. I never forgot how it felt. It became 
second nature to me to put a coin into a hungry man's 
hand and tell him to go and get something to eat. When 
whole villages of people came to me sometimes and com- 
plained that they had only porridge to eat, one meal a 
day, I used to say to them: "You cannot tell me any- 
thing about poverty. I, too, have lived by the week on 
little else than corn meal mush." They knew then that 
they were understood. 

From the beginning we had certain rules concerning 
definite acts of self-help which by common consent we 
felt bound to require from groups of believers. One of 
these was that if the Christians of a village wanted a 
schoolhouse, generally of mud walls and thatch roof, 
they must carry part of the outlay. But when I knew 
that many of them lived in huts which they could only 
with difficulty keep from tumbling to pieces over their 
heads, it went against my grain to enforce that rule. 
Then there was the question of supporting a teacher for 
their schools. The people often stinted themselves in 
order to do it. Those Madiga parents, like parents the 
world over, lived in their children. To see them learn 
to read was a satisfaction for which they were willing 
to deny themselves till it hurt. But there was pressure 
from several directions. The Sudra landowners, who 
employed the Madiga families, expected the children to 
come to work, at least to tend the buffaloes and sheep. 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 353 

If they went to school the portion of grain given the 
family was less in proportion. 

When I saw bright children out in the villages, and 
urged the parents to send them to school, I was often 
met with the cry, ''Then we, and they, too, must go 
hungry." By means of emphasis they slapped their 
wasted bodies to show me how thin a covering of flesh 
they had over their bones. When I was a boy in the 
newly settled West I had known families to deprive 
themselves almost of the necessaries of life in order to 
educate their children. But never had I seen them come 
so close to hunger as here among these Madigas, down- 
trodden for centuries. Over in Christian America there 
was abundance of money. Was it wrong to apply it to 
these people when they wanted to see their children take 
the first step out of degradation and ignorance? 

In these questions I fell back upon the training which 
I received in my youth and early manhood on what was 
then the frontier of American civilization. I had seen 
how money was poured in from the Eastern states to 
plant and endow educational institutions, to help students 
who needed help, to subsidize struggling churches. No 
one had taught us that money was bad. True, Ameri- 
cans were there helping Americans. The contention was 
that Asiatics should help Asiatics. But I felt that this 
was not just; for I believed that when an American mis- 
sionary society sent their messengers to a foreign land 
with tidings of salvation, and they were received by the 
people, then that society was under moral obligation to 
furnish the means to enable Asiatic people to take the 
first steps out of the old life into the new life. I knew 
how abundant the financial resources of Americans were, 
and I had seen when on furlough how willing they were 
to give. To me the agitation concerning self-support, 
at that time, seemed a violation of an unwritten contract 



354 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

between the missionary societies and the Asiatic people 
whom they had drawn under their influence and fur- 
nished with desires toward a code of Hfe that included 
education and social betterment. 

There was a wide difference between the thrifty, re- 
sourceful American pioneers among whom I grew up and 
my downtrodden Madigas. Their poverty pressed me 
sorely. I chafed under it often ; for I had to reckon with 
it ceaselessly. I was too loyal to the Madigas to say it, 
but if God had sent me the Sudras, how different it 
would have been! Then. I could have left behind me a 
self-supporting Christian community. The methods of 
self-help which were a partial success with the Madigas 
would have been a complete success with the Sudras. 
This was evidently not to be. The missionaries who 
came after me, too, had to face the poverty of the Madi- 
gas, and make up their minds that here was something 
that could knock over any scheme of self-help which they 
might try, no matter how patiently. Often at confer- 
ences I listened to their discussions, and when my turn 
came to speak I exclaimed, ''Brethren, you cannot squeeze 
blood out of a turnip!" It was a homely phrase, but it 
covered the ground and expressed my meaning. 

Our society, like most other missionary societies, was 
under pressure during those years in the direction of 
making it binding upon their missionaries to train the 
native Christians to self-help. Committees were set to 
work to ascertain the point which had been reached in 
this respect. We on the field received circulars asking 
us to state definitely what the churches in our care were 
doing in carrying their expenses. To an American com- 
mittee, accustomed to looking upon money as the medium 
of exchange, it must have seemed no answer at all, when 
we tried to tell them of Asiatic ways of payment in kind. 
I never tried my hand at figuring it out on paper; it 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 355 

could not be done. I would have had to go Into long ex- 
planations about the cooperative system of the Indian 
village community, with which American business men 
would not have wished to consume their time. Suppose 
the Sudra master, at harvest time, gave the Madiga a 
portion of grain in return for the labor of a season, and 
he passed some of this over to his preacher, or teacher, 
how was it to be expected that the record of this trans- 
action, repeated hundreds of times over the field, was to 
reach me, and reach me in a form useful for the making 
up of statistical tables? Moreover, I had some doubts 
about insisting upon computing how much each one gave. 
I liked their Indian way of giving, and did not believe in 
scrutinizing it too closely. 

My supply of funds from headquarters was cut down 
in 1885 ; cut down so that we all felt it. The Woman's 
Baptist Foreign Missionary Society of the West, which 
had been furnishing funds year after year for the edu- 
cation of our girls and women, was also compelled to cut 
down supplies. It was a trying time to those who were 
bearing the burdens at home, as well as to us. They were 
expected to answer questions which they had not the in- 
formation to answer. It took a knowledge of the way 
in which the people of the East live in order to determine 
whether the Christians were rising to a manly condition 
of self-help, or whether they were weakening under a 
system of foreign beneficence. 

I began now to talk this over with the older preachers. 
Rumor had reached them through their friends in other 
stations of our Telugu Mission that their missionaries 
were in similar straits: they all hail received an order 
from America to cut down the support given to their 
workers. In some of these stations monthly salaries 
were given by the missionaries. To cut these down 
meant hardships to the workers, and in some cases dis- 



356 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

missal for lack of funds. In this emergency our system 
at Ongole, of giving a quarterly subsidy, seemed to lend 
itself to a spirit of independence. Our workers felt that 
they could rise above this situation and relieve the mis- 
sion of their support, since they had not, at any time, 
depended solely upon the mission. 

What is called the Ongole method of self-support was 
evolved through stress of circumstances, and was there- 
fore adapted to the condition of the people. At the be- 
ginning of my work in Ongole, Yerraguntla Periah gave 
me the hints which I elaborated. He did not want sal- 
ary. If I had let him continue in the methods of the 
Indian religious teacher he would have taken care of 
himself. When I asked him to enter upon Christian 
propaganda, introducing American methods such as com- 
ing to Ongole at stated intervals to confer with me, he 
convinced me that this called for a subsidy of American 
money. This method justified itself abundantly; for the 
staff of workers on the field soon increased with such 
rapidity that if I had begun on the salary system I could 
not have carried it forward even before the ingathering, 
much less afterwards. 

The Ongole method of self-support is an organic 
part of the Ongole method of employing large native 
agency. The missionaries who have taken over the ten 
stations into which, in the course of years, the Ongole 
field was divided have, in most cases, seen no reason to 
depart from this method. It is said that missions of 
other societies, in their formative period, have taken note 
of our way of doing. It is a contribution not only from 
the theoretical point of view, but as something which has 
stood the test of practice. 

At that time, in 1885, the preachers felt that it would 
not require great self-denial if they were to cut loose 
from the financial support of the mission. We held a 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 357 

meeting and gave the older workers an opportunity to 
speak their minds. Very frank, straightforward words 
some of them spoke. They said : 

"If the American Christians think we have been children 
long enough and now must show how we can stand by our- 
selves, very well, we will try it. They have sent us a new 
religion, and have shown us a new way to live. For this we 
must be thankful to them. The mission is now giving us 
very little. We are willing to work without it. Our mem- 
bers would support us, if the crops were always good. But 
when they and their children have not enough to eat, how 
can they give to us ? Therefore, the only way for us to do 
is to eat of the labor of our hands. Some of us already 
own a little field and a buffalo or two. Our wives and 
children thus have something to depend upon when other 
supplies fail us. Let us work harder with our hands, and 
we can nevertheless go about preaching and ask nothing 
from the mission." 

I had to take them at their word, and I did it with 
great misgivings. It was the method of the Apostle Paul, 
yet he distinctly did not advocate this method for anyone 
else. I knew that only our most capable workers could 
make this a success. I feared that by gaining a point 
in self-support we might lose several points in the evan- 
gelistic work of the field. It was at best an experiment. 
I was glad when the way opened to me so that the work- 
ers could go back to the old order of things. 

With this question of self-support ever pressing upon 
us, a crisis was now coming upon our Telugu Mission. 
The force of missionaries for the past few years 
had been only barely sufficient for the needs of the 
field. We now had thirteen stations. The Ongole sta- 
tion still had about 15,000 Christians connected with it — 
surely a sufficient load, but I had seen heavier loads and 



358 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

did not complain. My field was now shut in, bounded on 
the north, west and south by other stations of our mis- 
sion. I could not extend my outposts, but I worked hard 
within my borders. 

The year 1886 marked an almost wholesale depletion 
of our ranks, as missionaries, leaving only about one 
half of our number on the field. Early in the year Dr. 
and Mrs. Jewett left India, both in very feeble health. 
They did not return, and thus one pillar of strength was 
removed. Dr. Jewett died in 1897. "With eyes uplifted 
toward heaven he beckoned with a familiar oriental ges- 
ture, and said, 'Come, Lord Jesus.' Then in a moment 
he exclaimed with rapture, *Jesus is coming.' After this 
he knew no more of earth." 

Dr. Williams had to go home with his family, which 
meant that another of my old comrades was gone. Two 
of the new stations established in the outlying taluks of 
the old Ongole field lost their missionaries through 
breakdown of health. One station came back to me for 
one year, the other for five years. The Hindus spread a 
report over those two fields that their gods had driven 
away two missionaries and the Americans were not go- 
ing to send any more to either place. I met this cry by 
stationing a Eurasian evangelist in one of those stations. 
The high school was transferred to me, and for five years 
it was without an American principal. I had to do the 
best I could to keep it going. I was made the burden 
bearer of the mission. Those were hard, grinding years. 
Work, work from morning till night. I called myself the 
head coolie of the district. 

When I realized that there was no immediate prospect 
of help from America I looked about me in India. Our 
boarding schools in Ongole were in the care of Eurasian 
ladies. I already had a Eurasian assistant stationed at 
the outposts. I now engaged another assistant to help 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 359 

me at Ongole, by being a kind of right-hand man. It 
worked well. During two and a half years I leaned a 
good deal on him, as he took more and more of the de- 
tail of the work off my hands. Death took him away. 
He said good-bye to me one morning to go on tour; he 
never went. Before he could start, typhoid fever laid 
him low, and twelve days later he was gone. To every- 
one who came to the bungalow and spoke his feelings by 
asking, "Why has God done this?" — my one reply was, 
"Jesus makes no mistakes." 

A year before this my physical strength had given 
way to the strain. By the blessing of God my excellent 
constitution had thus far been equal to th,e constant heavy 
work and care, without let-up. But now a break had 
come. Ill health was on me, and now indeed I was stag- 
gering at my post. It came through a tour into the 
Darsi taluk. I knew that my presence was needed in 
Ongole, and did not linger long anywhere. But it 
was a good tour, and I felt that I had never worked 
harder in touring in my life than during those fifteen 
days. I baptized 420. This done, I started for 
home, and as I was nearing Ongole I had to ride the 
last miles very slowly, because my pony had walked all 
the shoes off his feet, except the half of one, and his feet 
were sore. The slow riding meant long exposure to 
the sun. Already worn with overwork, it was too much 
for me. A slight sunstroke was the result. Dizzy at- 
tacks now became the order of the day whenever I 
worked a little beyond my strength. My physical elas- 
ticity was gone and my resources grew less and less. 
Afterwards an eminent surgeon in America said I must 
have burst a blood vessel in the brain during that tour, 
and that it was a wonder I survived at all. Yet it was 
not till two years from that time that I was released and 
could go on furlough. 



360 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

What was against me now in my broken-down condi- 
tion was the inability of the people to grasp the fact that 
the one on whom they had been laying their burdens for 
many a year was now scarcely able to bear his own. 
They were so accustomed to see me in my place and al- 
ways at work that when I now had my doors closed, and 
it was said that I was sick, it seemed beyond their com- 
prehension. But the government medical officer at On- 
gole saw what was needed. He ordered me to our little 
bungalow at Kottapatam by the sea, ten miles east of 
Ongole, and there I now- stayed much of the time; for 
there I could rest and yet could keep my hand on the 
work in Ongole. 

It would not have been possible for me to hold that 
field together in a thriving condition if it had not been 
for the strong band of native preachers who were a part 
of the movement. I was at the head, and formed the 
link between the field and our society in America. They 
did the rest. The group of men who came to us at the 
beginning now stood out with prominence. The people 
called them the "big, or elder, preachers." They were 
the men who had made the search for truth in Hindu 
religious movements before they knew anything of the 
Christian religion. Their apprenticeship as Christian 
preachers had been served under me; they had stood by 
my side during famine and ingathering. They were pil- 
lars of strength to me. We had had successive classes of 
graduates from the theological seminary, and some of 
them were leaders among their people. But those "big 
preachers" had a place in the hearts of us all which was 
undisputed. Somehow there was a spiritual background 
with those men which we all felt, and to which we 
yielded the first place. 

I began to wonder whether the time had come when 
the strength of this work would have to undergo a severe 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 36 1 

test. It would have been premature to make the native 
church wholly responsible. But with no missionaries 
from America in sight, our appeals bringing no apparent 
response — it looked as if something of that kind might 
be coming at a time not very far off. Sometimes, when 
too ill for days to leave my bed, I told myself that it 
would not take much to extinguish the little flame of life 
that was now only flickering in my body. If they carried 
all that remained of me around the hill to our cemetery, 
then what would become of this Ongole Mission? 

I felt that I wanted to talk this over with those faith- 
ful men, the ''big preachers" of the mission. Yerraguntla 
Periah was still with us, an old man now, but a host in 
himself. There were others like him. They had evi- 
dently faced the situation from their own point of view. 
They saw how I was left alone year after year. Their 
one fear was that some day they might come to Ongole 
and find that I was gone, sent out of the country per- 
haps, suddenly, by doctor's orders, as is sometimes the 
case in India. I asked them what they would do if I had 
to leave them. They refused to face this. They said 
they would do all the work contentedly if only they knew 
that I was at Ongole and had not left them. I said, "Sup- 
pose the day is near when you will have to learn to stand 
with no white missionary to help you." They replied, 
"We cannot do it yet. Wait till our children grow up. 
They are in school, and are getting the education that is 
necessary before we native people can stand alone. Stay 
with us till they are grown up. Then we will be able to 
get on without missionaries from America. Not yet." 
There it was left. I could give them no assurance. I 
told them we must all look to God for help ; for the work 
was his. 

After I had taken them into my confidence, the preach- 
ers looked about on their fields, and talked the situation 



362 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

over together. There were converts everywhere in the 
villages ready for baptism. The preachers had put them 
off and told them to wait till "our Clough Dhora" could 
come on tour, or some other missionary. As they real- 
ized that no one could come to them, they began to ask 
themselves why they should not gather the people to- 
gether and take them to Ongole for baptism. It required 
some concerted action : the villages needed to be stirred. 
Rumors began to spread from village to village that large 
companies of converts were going to walk long dis- 
tances to Ongole to receive baptism. Even those who 
lived thirty or forty miles from Ongole did not hesitate. 
It meant several days of walking, at the rate of ten 
miles a day, and there were the weary miles back home. 
They knew they would be footsore in doing it. But a 
revival was once more sweeping over the Madiga com- 
munity. To go to Ongole and receive Christian baptism 
was the one thing they wanted to do, and they forgot the 
miles they had to walk. 

I became aware of this movement. It looked as if 
upon us, who were so little able to bear more than 
a very quiet daily routine, a revival was now coming, 
the like of which we had not seen since the great in- 
gathering thirteen years before. When the preachers 
came to the usual quarterly meeting, December 14, 
1890, they brought with them 352 converts for bap- 
tism. They told me that many more were waiting, 
and urged me not to put them off much longer, lest 
they grow disheartened. We therefore decided on an- 
other meeting two weeks hence. 

The preachers went out into the villages to gather the 
converts. Saturday afternoon, December ^y, a great 
crowd began pouring into the mission compound. Sun- 
day morning we saw that the chapel could not hold one 
third of the people ; for they had come by thousands. We 




"One thing I knozv: I loved the people. And zvhen I told them in the 
simplest words that I could use about Jesus Christ and liis love for them, they 
somehow believed me. Whether my listeners were a few, or zvhether they 
were a crowd, by the time I was done telling them of Jesus' love they believed 
in it and wanted it." 



SELF-SUPPORT IN PRACTICE 363 

discarded the chapel and seated the people under the 
margosa trees near the veranda of my study. I stood on 
the veranda steps and preached to them for an hour on 
my favorite text : "Come unto me, all ye that labor and 
are heavy laden." After the sermon the preachers spent 
some hours in the examination of those who had come 
for baptism. 

We began baptizing early in the afternoon in the bap- 
tistery under the big tamarind tree in the middle of the 
garden, close to my bungalow. Two preachers officiated 
at a time, much as we had done at Vellumpilly twelve and 
a half years before. It took four and one half hours, 
and the total was 1,671. Many who could not come the 
fifty or sixty miles into Ongole sent us urgent appeals to 
come out there and baptize them. I could not go, and I 
had no one to send. 

A revival was on us. It was not confined to Ongole. 
From the time way back in 1869, two years after I be- 
gan work in Ongole, when a revival broke out in Cum- 
bum, and hundreds were baptized, that field had continued 
fruitful and prosperous. During the past eight years it 
had been independent of Ongole, with its own mission- 
ary, Rev. John Newcomb. Ongole and Cumbum now 
kept pace. During the three months beginning with the 
quarterly meeting in December, 1890, we at Ongole bap- 
tized 3,765 converts, the missionary at Cumbum 1,466. 
Cumbum at the time of the great ingathering belonged to 
Ongole, and the proportion of baptisms now approached 
closely the relative figures at that time. There was no 
famine now ; no one had reason to look for material bene- 
fits. The people had become roused; they were asking 
about spiritual gifts; they knew they had souls and 
wanted to find a way to save them. 

Thus did God show us that he could work his will and 
complete his own purposes wholly regardless of what was 



364 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

done by the churches in America. To teach men and 
women to believe in Jesus Christ was what he had called 
us to do. They were believing by thousands. We had 
not the strength to gather them in. It looked almost as 
if the Telugu Mission had had a life all its own, and as if 
the Lord Jesus had taken it into his special care. 



XXI 

THE RESPONSE AT HOME 

Those years in the eighties were a time of great strain 
in the foreign missionary enterprise. It came through 
the far-reaching changes that were taking place the 
world over. The East was waking up, and the West was 
becoming aware of great opportunities open to those 
who knew how to seize them. 

Travelers were going around the world, bringing back 
tidings of the ancient civilizations they had seen. Com- 
merce was spreading fast ; political relations were grow- 
ing; consular service became a necessity; and ambassa- 
dors from Western governments were sent to nations of 
the East, whose doors had until recently been closed to 
the white race. 

The men and women of our nation were beginning to 
take a keen interest in the races populating distant parts 
of the world. The resourcefulness of the Asiatics was a 
marvel to Americans, as they read about them in the daily 
papers. Many had first heard about oriental races in 
missionary meetings. It was now more than twenty years 
since the women of the churches had put forth organized 
efforts. They had carried the children with them, en- 
listing their sympathy. These children were growing 
into manhood and womanhood and gave evidence of 
their training. 

We missionaries at the outposts were sending home to 

36s 



366 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

our constituency reports of the fields open and waiting 
for occupancy. We were appealing for a more aggres- 
sive policy. The question was whether missionary ac- 
tivities could keep step with the progress of the time. 
There was much response in the home churches. Men 
saw that a new basis for missionary endeavor was 
needed; something far-reaching must be undertaken. 
The missionary societies were under fire, especially from 
the financial point of view. Existing methods seemed too 
slow. There were aggressive men who pointed out that 
since the world was now open, men and women of zeal 
should be given brief missionary training, and sent out 
in numbers to carry the gospel to all parts of the world. 
An idea prevailed that by some sudden process the 
heathen were to believe in Jesus Christ, to form them- 
selves into churches, become self-sustaining, and then 
promptly be left to themselves. The various attempts to 
solve the question of winning the world for Christ were 
watched with deep interest. Men were working their 
way through to new ideas of Christian activity. 

During those years, while the missionary motive de- 
manded expansion, the call for social service began dis- 
tinctly to be heard in the churches. Forerunners of a 
new era talked of the kingdom of Christ which was to 
come on earth, to save not only the souls of men, but 
their whole environment. Social Christianity was wak- 
ing up the churches at home. The effects were felt on 
the foreign field. Men were introducing business meth- 
ods into phases of Christian life that had lain dormant. 
The energy of modern Western civilization pulsated in 
movements that united business capacity and strategic 
skill to the desire to exalt Jesus Christ in the hearts of 
men. The Young Men's Christian Association had for 
years been doing pioneer work in this respect, and was 
now carrying its work to foreign lands. It was the first 



THE RESPONSE AT HOME 367 

movement of the kind that gathered Christian men into 
one united effort beyond the boundary lines of denomi- 
nationalism. 

Situations such as existed in our Telugu Mission 
brought into clear outline the demand for larger re- 
sources. There was no adequate recruiting agency at 
the command of the missionary boards to form the link 
between the demands of the foreign field and the supply 
which had to be drawn from the theological institutions 
and the men already in the pastorate. As a first step 
toward concerted action the Inter- Seminary Alliance 
was formed during those years. It was a united effort 
of missionary societies, and was in the right direction. 
But something more far-reaching was needed. The de- 
mand for men on the foreign field continued to outrun 
the supply available. The boards were ever under pres- 
sure. They enlisted a man here and a man there, while 
they felt that the call of the hour was for an uprising of 
many men, ready to respond. The time was ripe for 
such an undertaking as the Student Volunteer Movement. 

It was in the summer of 1886. Three hundred stu- 
dents from ninety colleges were in conference at North- 
field. Christian service was the subject; no one talked 
of foreign missions. A nucleus of men among the stu- 
dents, however, had a spiritual passion for the world's 
evangelization. They met in their rooms ; others joined 
them. It spread. A call went out to every one of the 
students. They had meetings of consecration of which 
men afterwards could not speak without deep emotion. 
A pledge was passed around, expressing the willingness, 
if God permit, to become a foreign missionary. One 
hundred of the men signed it. They went back to their 
studies. Two of them visited the colleges of the United 
States from East to West. The young intellectual life of 
America was touched. It was a great onward move- 



368 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

ment, which had due regard for denominational lines, 
and yet, in the spirit of it, went far beyond them. The 
urgent call from the foreign field was answered by thou- 
sands of Student Volunteers. 

All this would not have been possible if there had not 
been a deep undercurrent of missionary interest in the 
churches, ready always to flow forth to meet an emer- 
gency. It was fed by the tidings which came home from 
the foreign field. Each denomination had its special 
fields, with which the men and women and children of 
the churches became acquainted, as with something that 
belonged to them. The Baptists had no mission dearer to 
them than the Telugu Mission. There were men still 
living who were present during the "Lone Star" debate 
at Albany, in 1853. They gave their reminiscences. 
Other points of contact had been made. In emergencies 
the men and women of those days had helped. It was a 
rich experience in their lives. It had happened in their 
own lifetime that prophecy had been fulfilled, and that 
something that looked a good deal like a miracle had 
taken place. After all, it was not only in Bible times 
that men were moved as by divine inspiration. Such 
things had happened in their own day. Men did not 
weary of the story. 

Year after year the call from the Telugu Mission beg- 
ging for reen for cement was heard in the churches. We 
were not alone in this. The missions in China, Japan, 
Burma and Africa were calling for men. We men at 
the front were bowed down under our burdens till our 
cries rose to God Almighty. Help was coming. The 
churches were slowly becoming roused. Men were feel- 
ing after information. If some one would rise up and 
point out the way a host was ready to follow. Pastors 
and laymen were talking it over together. There was an 
undercurrent of impatience. Men were weary of these 



I 



THE RESPONSE AT HOME 369 

cries from their mission fields. Something must be done. 
Many were ready to act. 

The annual meeting of 1890 came. Again the re- 
ports from the several mission fields contained one long 
plea for reenforcement. We of the Telugu Mission had 
sent home an appeal, to which we all had signed our 
names. We were nine men and twelve women, in 
charge of ten mission stations and 33,000 Telugu 
Christians. Our appeal was printed. It was distributed 
during the meetings, and touched the hearts of many 
who felt that this could no longer be endured. 

A crisis was at hand. Dr. Murdock was the one who 
met it. He was nearing the close of a long term of ser- 
vice as Foreign Secretary. With his wide outlook he 
knew the signs of the times. He knew that a period of 
reconstruction for our society was at hand. What form 
the change would take he did not know. The few can- 
didates for foreign service of that year were standing 
on the platform. They had told briefly of their call to 
the service, and had received words of cheer and advice. 
Now came a sudden turn in events, unexpected but far- 
reaching. Dr. Henry C. Mabie was sitting in the audi- 
ence. Dr. Murdock requested him to come to the plat- 
form and offer the dedicatory prayer. He went up, and 
stood with the candidates. He turned to the audience 
and asked permission to speak. Words fell in a torrent 
from his lips. All that other men had felt, and longed 
to express, he now said for them. It raised a storm of 
sympathetic response. The dedicatory prayer was of- 
fered. This prayer marked a turn in the history of the 
society. 

The progressive element among the pastors wanted Dr. 
Mabie to represent them. The next day he was elected 
Home Secretary of the society. A new office was thus 
created. There was to be a united effort at enlargement 



370 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

and expansion. It was decided that the new secretary 
should first travel around the world, and visit the mis- 
sions of the society in Japan, China, Burma and India, 
and study the needs of the field. The denomination was 
getting ready to do something on a new scale. They 
were prepared to stand by him when he came back with 
his report, no matter what the demand might be. 

I heard of all this, and was glad. I had had personal 
contacts with Dr. Mabie since the time when he was a lad 
of seventeen, and I rode over the prairies of Iowa with 
his uncle, telling him of. my call to the foreign field. 
Twice in the course of the years I appealed to him to 
come to India. I always felt the man would have to 
come some day. He wrote to me now : "You see, the 
way is opening to go myself at last. I have yearned to 
go and personally relieve you for a time, that you might 
come home to rest. Cheer up, beloved, Til do my best, 
and I am daily by your side via the mercy seat." He 
came in January, 1891. We were to meet him in Nel- 
lore and have a conference with him. I rode all night in 
my cart, and when I halted, at early dawn, before the 
mission bungalow in Nellore, he stood there in the gray 
light. I put my hands on his shoulders and shook him, 
and said, "We have you here at last, old fellow. Now 
get away again, if you can." 

Decisive plans for the future of the Telugu Mission 
were now made. The whole field, from north to south, 
was to be reen forced. The new secretary, supported by 
my fellow-missionaries, laid it upon me to go to America, 
enlist twenty-five men for the Telugu Mission, and col- 
lect $50,000 to equip them. The division of the Ongole 
field was part of the project. My impaired health had 
shown to us all that if I were permanently incapacitated, 
or withdrawn by death, the result might be disastrous 
to the work. I was to provide for it while it was still 



THE RESPONSE AT HOME 371 

in my power to do so. It was not an easy decision for 
me to face. I had seen this emergency ahead only as 
through a glass, dimly. My load was heavy, to be sure, 
but there was much consolation in carrying it. Very 
reluctantly I yielded, and agreed to the new plans. 

It was hard to break away from Ongole. The people 
protested. The faithful band of preachers came in from 
the field. It took me three days to convince them of 
the necessity for my going, and to put courage into 
them. Upon them, and upon all the thousands who 
now came and went, inquiring what was going to be 
done, I put a burden which they promised to carry. 
They agreed to pray every day for my success in Amer- 
ica, that I might get the twenty-five men and the 
needed money, and come back to them soon. Consid- 
ering that we had 30,000 members, who in varying de- 
gree of faithfulness voiced this petition every day — it 
produced a volume of power. They used to add, "Let 
him get it easily ; for he is not well." 

I arrived in Boston May 17, 1891. The annual meet- 
ings were to be held in Cincinnati ten days later. To 
go there and state before a great audience what I had 
come home to get for my mission was a task suited to 
a well man, not to one who had to hoard his strength 
as a miser does his gold. If I could have spoken in 
Telugu, to dusky faces, I would not have cared how 
many thousands were before me. But my English 
tongue for public speaking was rusty. I quietly went on 
the platform during the morning session, and sat there 
to get accustomed to a sea of white faces. 

As the time approached for my address, in the eve- 
ning, my strength was sinking. Nevertheless, I was 
upheld. The house was packed. I spoke for forty 
minutes. When I came before the audience, they ap- 
plauded. It was the last thing I wanted. I stretched 



572 SOCIAL CinaSTIANITY IN THE OWENT 

out my arm and made the emphatic, rapid movement 
with my hand which is the Telugu gesture for, "No, no ; 
I do not want it." Some of the papers reported that I 
put forth my hand as if to ward off a blow. I knew 
how my countrymen enjoyed having their feelings stirred 
by missionary adventure. On former visits in America 
I sometimes told them we did not want their tears, be- 
cause missions were not rim by water power. The 
papers talked of me as a venerable old man, yet I was 
only fifty-five years of age, grown prematurely old 
through the burdens I had carried. 

I began by saying, "Fathers and Brethren of the For- 
eign Mission, Society, you will have to be patient with me. 
I will do the best I can, but I am not well. I have not 
an English tongue with me, and I have been in the 
United States only ten days. God help you to under- 
stand our situation." I told them in simple words how 
the Telugu Mission had grown until now it was neces- 
sary to make some special effort to establish it. We must 
have twenty-five new men, and also $50,000 to send 
these men out and build houses for them and provide 
their salaries for one year. I asked them to grant 
this request soon, without expecting great labor from 
me; for I was broken in health, and must regain my 
strength in order to go back to my people in India. 
Nearly five thousand dollars were subscribed at this meet- 
ing. The Baptists were stirred. 

This was the sequel to that memorable meeting in 
Albany, in 1853, when men wept because they felt the 
abandonment of the Telugu Mission was not to be en- 
dured. Here now they had a man before them who for 
years had been staggering under the load of the harvest 
that had come. I made a heavy demand upon them. 
They granted ever)rthing for which I asked. One year 
later, most of the twenty-five men, and as many women, 



I 



THE RESPONSE AT HOMT: ^3 

stood on the platform together, at the annual meeting, 
ready to go to the Telugu Mission. Fifty thousand 
dollars were given to me twice over, because when the 
first was on hand, we asked for an endowment for a 
college at Ongole. Often, out in India, I had felt forsaken 
by my constituency. Now when I came home, and stood 
before the men of my denomination, they granted every- 
thing I asked of them. Had I asked for more they 
would not have withheld it. 

The Lord Jesus was in it. The work in the Telugu 
Mission was his work. I was only the man who had tried 
to do his bidding, all through the years. When now 
I formed the link with his followers in America, there 
was instant response. He was bringing the uttermost 
parts of the earth together in spiritual contact. 

I could not begin my task at once. Six months were 
passed with my family in recuperation. Meanwhile I 
was getting my bearings. I soon found that I was being 
carried along by the strong current of spiritual energy 
and consecration which had been generated by the 
Student Volunteer Movement. When I had to find four 
men for the Telugu Mission in 1873, ^ ^^^ ^^ move- 
ment of that kind to help me. It was as hard then to 
get the four as it was now to get the twenty-five. Bap- 
tists had participated in that movement. Some of the 
leaders in it were Baptists. Ten of the twenty-five men 
whom I enlisted for the Telugus had signed the Volun- 
teer Declaration. No wonder that a man like me, worn 
with service, could find his twenty-five recruits before 
a year had passed by. 

Everywhere I found the hearts of people warm with 
interest in the Telugu Mission. The story of it had 
been told and retold. Yet they wanted to hear more. 
It was no longer possible for me to go about and hold 
meetings at rapid intervals, as I did on previous visits 



374 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

in the United States. Generally several churches com- 
bined in some large gathering. Thus I could reach many 
with a minimum of effort. Dr. Mabie was conducting 
a campaign in which the home forces of the society par- 
ticipated. Great meetings were held. The second of 
these was at Des Moines, Iowa. I was present, and 
found myself on familiar ground, in the state from 
which I was sent to India. Faces of old friends greeted 
me. The warm grasp of their hands showed me that I 
was not forgotten. Men from adjoining states were 
there. The meetings overflowed from the Baptist meet- 
ing-house into the larger Presbyterian edifice. On the 
closing night the large opera house of the city was 
freely offered. Crowds were coming that night to hear 
me tell the story of the Telugu Mission. Not less than 
fifteen men and women soon after volunteered for service 
abroad. Several of these are to this day filling prominent 
places in various missions. The men for the Telugus 
were coming, and now we were recruiting other mis- 
sions as well. Those who had long been looking for 
some great forward movement began to think that signs 
of it were at hand. 

There were great celebrations in America at that time. 
The year 1892 completed four hundred years since the 
discovery of America by Columbus. The World's Fair 
was held in Chicago. Americans were in a mood to do 
something big, and to see money poured out in streams. 
The missionary enterprise, too, had a centenary to cele- 
brate. It was now one hundred years since Dr. William 
Carey went to India. The Baptists in England were rais- 
ing a centenary fund of £100,000 for their foreign mis- 
sions. 

The American Baptists had helped support Carey and 
his associates till Adoniram Judson, in 18 14, gave us 
occasion to form our own missionary society. We de- 



THE RESPONSE AT HOME 375 

cided that we, too, would celebrate the Carey Centenary. 
A million dollars and one hundred new missionaries were 
called for, to reenforce all our mission fields. The Bap- 
tists had never faced such an undertaking before. But 
the Telugu Mission had already served as the enter- 
ing wedge. Men and money on a large scale were in 
sight. The denomination rose to the call. At the end 
of 1892 the project was announced a complete success. 
The first part of my task was finished when 1892 be- 
gan. Then there came a call for a second $50,000. 
The leading high caste inhabitants of Ongole had sent a 
petition to our Foreign Mission Society, signed by about 
fifty of them. They requested in very courteous and 
urgent terms that our high school in Ongole might be 
raised to the grade of a college. They wished hence- 
forth to look to the Baptist Mission for the education 
of their sons, paying fees as they would in a govern- 
ment institution. They wrote: 

"Missionaries have been sent out to preach the Christian 
faith. While fulfilling the object of their mission, they have 
not ignored the general status of the people ; with a view to 
develop the nobler qualities of man they have awakened in 
them a desire after Western education." 



This petition was regarded in Boston as an historical 
document. A long road lay between the request it con- 
tained and the time in 1867 when the Brahmans of 
Ongole broke up, for the time being, a government 
school, because I tried to bring three Christian boys 
into it. The change was considered a sign of the times. 
Again I had opposition to face. My fellow-mission- 
aries were against the project almost to a man. They 
united in sending a protest to Boston : they did not want 
a college, because few Christian lads were ready to 



37^ SOCIAL CH&ISTIAinTY IK THS OKESZTT 

enter, and the heathen, they claimed, should have no 
consideration in this matter. In America, too, here and 
there, the old argument against the use of mission 
money for secular education of the heathen was revived. 
I held out against it all. I knew I was on the right 
road. Several other missionary societies in America and 
in Europe had founded and endowed large colleges in 
non-Christian lands. I refused to believe that we Baptists 
could be on the wrong track by endowing a college for 
our growing Christian community of about 200,000 ad- 
herents, letting the caste people send their sons to it, ac- 
cording to their request. 

I went ahead. I had the leading men of our society 
with me. Dr. Mabie told Americans of his interview 
with the Brahmans of Ongole, when they requested 
him to tell his countrymen that they would intrust their 
sons to our care. Dr. Murdock handled the situation 
in a masterly fashion. From beginning to end through 
all the years he had stood by me with an unwavering 
support, while I sought to provide educational equipment 
for our Telugu Christians. Through the denominational 
press the two secretaries announced the project of a 
second $50,000 for the Telugu Mission, as an endow- 
ment for a college. 

I had been going, in a friendly way, to the home of 
John D. Rockefeller, but had not thus far asked him 
to help me. Now I told him I needed him. Ten years 
before he gave money for our large high school build- 
ing. He agreed to take half of this present load upon 
himself; he knew I could carry the other half. In six 
months the task was completed. An illiterate people 
I had found those Madigas twenty years before. There 
was no reason now why they should not have physicians 
and lawyers and teachers and government officials of 
their own, to help in the uplifting of their fellows. 



THE RESPONSE AT HOME 377 

This last stroke of work was strenuous, but by it the 
permanence of our Telugu Mission was assured. If now 
by death, or other cause, I were removed from my post, it 
would apparently make no difference. The stability of 
the work was insured, so far as resources from America 
were concerned. I returned to India toward the end 
of 1892, prepared to help in the readjustments proposed. 

Two of my daughters, with their husbands, were 
among the new missionaries, and had preceded me. 
My two sons were settled in business in America. My 
youngest daughter was in college. Mrs. Clough had 
made a home for our children until they had obtained 
a college education, and for my aged mother till she 
died. My children grew up without the personal care of 
their father, except by weekly letters, but they had the 
wise care of their mother. 

A few months after my return to Ongole our family 
circle was greatly bereaved in the death of Mrs. Clough. 
The cable message came to us in India like a sudden 
blow. Through an accident a heavy article of furniture 
fell upon her. A long pc^riod of unconsciousness fol- 
lowed. She died on the morning of May 15, 1893. The 
sudden nature of her death accentuated the sorrow which 
was widely expressed. 

It was a somewhat dark time for me out in India. 
I did not see my way before me clearly. My field 
was to be divided. I cannot say that it was easy for 
me to let the care of the people pass into other hands. 
I had known for years that this was bound to come, 
and had done all in my power to bring it to pass. Our 
Christians, too, had known that it was coming, and 
willingly now entered into the changes which it brought. 
I waited until the new missionaries had had a year for 
the study of the Telugu language. Then, one after an- 
other, they took over portions of my old field, follow- 



37^ SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

ing the taluk boundaries. Each man built a bungalow 
in the taluk town, and began the activities of a separate 
mission station. The original Ongole field had covered 
more than ten taluks. The outlying taluks had been 
made independent fields in 1883. The rest were staked 
oflF now. I kept the Ongole taluk and one adjoining it. 

Again we dealt with large groups in giving letters of 
dismissal from the Ongole church to those who were 
now to form new churches in their taluk towns. Again 
I sent the people away with words of blessing, com- 
mitting them to the care of the Lord Jesus, as I had 
always done. I told them to be faithful in their new 
relations, but to remember the Ongole Mission always as 
their mother. I felt it keenly when I had to give up 
the Kanigiri taluk. The old Kanigiri preachers were 
sitting on the platform once more with the rest. Their 
faces brought to my memory the old days, when the 
movement began in the Kanigiri taluk and spread so 
fast. To their new missionary, who stood on the plat- 
form with me, I said, **I give you the apple of my eye. 
Take care of that field/' He still remains with them. 

The twenty-five new men reenforccd our Telugu Mis- 
sion from north to south. For the first time in our 
history we could say that our mission was well-manned. 
We had staked our boundaries in 1873. Strategic points 
had been waiting for occupancy. Now we could bring 
our plans to pass. By the time our adjustments were 
completed we had more than twenty mission stations, 
and in several of them additional men were located for 
educational or medical work. There was much activity, 
much reaching out. In some of the more remote places 
the new missionaries found new ground, and entered 
upon no man's labors. In the fields, however, that had 
formerly belonged to the Ongole field, it was otherwise. 



THE RESPONSE AT HOME 379 

Definite methods were here in operation, with the evi- 
dence of years of work. 

Naturally the new missionaries were under pressure 
from the first to give their close attention to uniting the 
people into self-sustaining churches. That was the point 
where the work of our Telugu Mission was considered 
weak. It was now to be strengthened, since we had 
men in sufficient numbers from America to devote them- 
selves to the task. I looked on at their efforts and helped 
them all I could. I knew that the Western conception 
of the Church was not necessarily adapted to an Eastern 
community. I had tried it, and had made only a partial 
success of it. But I said nothing to them about my 
doubts. I wanted them to bring it to pass, if it could 
be done. My only fear was that they might pay too 
high a price for any success they might achieve, by 
sacrificing the spiritual growth of the people to a rigid 
adherence to Western customs and traditions. 

The men did their best. They talked it over among 
themselves and at the annual conferences ; they put their 
theories to the test ; they made experiments, as they had 
perfect freedom to do. But when they advocated some 
new measure, they found in trying to convince the staff 
of workers of its expediency that they had come upon 
conservative forces that held more or less tenaciously to 
that which had been handed down from the past. Our 
native preachers and teachers formed a continuity of 
management. At that time the older men among them, 
who had helped me evolve the Ongole methods, were 
still living. They gathered around the new missionaries 
with the loyalty that had made me prize them as 
fellow-workers. They had taught me to see with their 
eyes, and had often in the course of the years made me 
prune down my opinions and intentions. I knew all 



^80 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY Ilf THE ORIEIfT 

along that the same process would modify the views of 
my successors. 

Notwithstanding the diversity among the new mis- 
sionaries, and the fact that they came to their work 
with preconceived ideas, they nevertheless, with few ex- 
ceptions, adhered to the methods which they found in 
force. They had adaptability. Their common sense 
showed them that the American type of Christianity did 
not fit in all cases into the conditions which they here 
found. After all, given the people, and given the 
peculiar circumstances of the case, we had taken the line 
of least resistance. It did not therefore fall to my lot 
to be forced to stand by while the work I had built 
up was going to pieces. Here and there, in some isolated 
case, I had to bear this. That I was spared an ex- 
perience of the kind on a large scale I count as one of 
the mercies of my missionary life. 

I have been asked what I would do if I were once 
more at the beginning of my missionary career; would 
I bend all my energies to efforts of church organiza- 
tion, or would I make it my chief aim to preach the 
gospel of Jesus? I unhesitatingly say: I would let all 
the rest go, and just preach Jesus as the Saviour of men. 
I am glad I did all in my power to give educational 
opportunities to the people. I would again raise up largo 
native agency. I would again organize groups of be- 
lievers, serving God in the simple ways of their village 
life. I would again do all I could for their social bet- 
terment. Above all, I would preach Jesus, the Christ, to 
them, and I would consider everything else subservient 
to that. 

I can well bear the criticism that I failed, at least par^ 
tially, in organizing churches on a self-sustaining basis. 
It is a minor charge. The day will come when Western 
people will cease to expect the people of the East to 



THE RESPONSE AT HOME 38 1 

adopt their customs and forms of thought along with 
their faith in Jesus. 

The invulnerable fact of the Ongole Mission is that 
many thousands believed in Jesus Christ as their Saviour, 
and tried to serve him. They continued in that faith 
and died in it. For this I thank God. 

The work goes on. A good force of missionaries is 
at the head. The descendants of the converts of the old 
days form a large proportion of the men and women 
in our Telugu churches to-day. The boys and girls who 
received an education in our mission schools in the early 
years form the present nucleus of the more intelligent 
members of the Christian community. Our Telugu Mis- 
sion stands as an instance of raising to better social 
conditions the submerged tenth of that land. 



XXII 

THE END OF LIFE 

Thirty years had passed since the call of the Far East 
rang in my ears and I was sent out to the most forlorn 
and desolate mission of the American Baptists. The 
times had changed. The Lord Jesus had brought into 
the lives of thousands a new and uplifting power and had 
expanded his Kingdom. 

My own work was now practically finished. I had 
lived a strenuous life. I had been a part of a great and 
divine movement. I had given myself to it with all my 
heart and soul. Then, because it seemed necessary for 
the stability of the interests which I had cherished, I 
had laid upon younger shoulders much of the responsi- 
bility which I had carried. This left me in a measure 
free. I felt that I still had capacity for work ; I was not 
yet sixty years old. How to utilize the years still before 
me was not clear to me. 

During the summer of 1894 I left my post at Ongole 
for a few months and went to Europe. During my 
sojourn there I was married to Miss Emma Rauschen- 
busch, and we returned together to India in the fall 
of that year. As I told her at that time, I intended to 
stay only two years longer. 

But old ties reasserted themselves. The associations 
of my life were bound up with my old bungalow in 
Ongole. I could not bring myself to leave it. It was 
all the home I had. America had ceased to seem like 

382 



THE END OF LIFE 383 

home to me. Had I gone there, I would have felt as a 
stranger in the land of my birth. I had children and 
grandchildren in India as well as in America. More- 
over, just at this time, my ten-acre orange grove in 
Florida, which was beginning to make me independent 
of other income, was killed by one night's sharp frost. 
Even the roots of my trees were dead. It changed my 
outlook. I did not want to draw pension. I preferred 
to stay at my post and work. 

The native people held me. They would have pro- 
tested strongly against my going. Ongole had been 
the center of the movement. As long as I was in the 
old place, always accessible, the people felt that two 
essential elements of the days of our early strength 
were intact. Ongole and Clough were names which 
could not be separated in the minds of a host of people. 
The contacts which I had made with men of all castes 
and kinds in the course of the years were still in force. 
My withdrawal would have broken them off prematurely. 
I felt this, and feared the effect might be far-reaching. 

Sometimes one of my old trusted men came to On- 
gole and sat down with me in my study, as formerly, 
and opened his heart to me. They all told me it was 
well that the division of the field had been made. They 
were loyal to their new missionaries. But they wanted 
me to stay on at Ongole : it made a difference to them. 
They said : ^Though you do no work, and sit quietly in 
your chair, with the punkah swinging over your head, it 
helps us. We are kept settled in mind, and go about 
our work as before. If the caste people ask us whether 
our Clough Dhora has left us, we can tell them that he 
is still in the old bungalow at Ongole.'* 

There was the point: this movement had grown to 
large proportions in a short span of years. I had no 
fears. Still, I was not certain but that some day, by 



384 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

some unforeseen combination of circumstances, the 
people might move away from us in masses, just as 
they had come in masses. That staff of preachers of 
the old days knew this as well as I; for they and I 
had watched over and shepherded the multitude, and the 
Lord Jesus had kept them from straying-. The well- 
meant words of my old fellow-workers contained a val- 
uable hint as to a necessary safeguard. That is one 
reason why I stayed on. 

The Ongole methods were not yet fully established 
as legitimate methods of missionary operations. I had 
broken away from a rigid adherence to the Western 
forms of Christianity. Some of the men who were at 
work where Ongole methods prevailed would perhaps 
have been disposed to make radical changes, which, later 
on, they might have found cause to regret, if I had 
not been at Ongole. Some recognized this and gave me 
evidence of allegiance which I keenly appreciated. In 
general I stood in the way of those who sought a closer 
approach to American methods of evangelization and 
organization. 

Often I realized that I could be proud of our Telugu 
Mission. Never was this more the case than when the 
Canadian Baptist Mission north of us joined our mis- 
sion in a conference at Ongole in December, 1895. ^^ 
took an afternoon for a service on Prayer Meeting Hill. 
A long procession of missionaries and native Christians 
walked together up the hill, singing hymns. As sunset 
drew near, a cloud hung over the hill, covered with rosy 
light. It touched us, as we stood up there, praising our 
God. Below, in the Ongole bazaar, the caste people gath- 
ered and watched that hilltop, pointing to it as some- 
thing supernatural. They said, "Their God is hovering 
over them. Our opposition is useless. They are bound 
to conquer." 



THE END OF LIFE 385 

A new day was coming. Young men and women, 
trained in our institutions, were making themselves felt 
with their fresh strength. They brought in new ideas, 
new methods and a new spirit. Western thought was 
pulsating in the India of to-day, and touched this 
younger generation, whose parents had risen from a 
bondage that was almost serfdom. The leaders of the 
old days, who had borne the brunt of a social uprising 
among their people, were beginning to bend under the 
load of the years. Some of them saw their own sons 
taking their places, educated as they had longed to see 
them. The fathers had not suffered in a thankless task. 
God had granted to them according to the desires of 
their hearts. 

Groups of the old leaders came to Ongole during 1896 
to tell their stories. They stood for the history of the 
movement. We could not let them die, one after another, 
and take away with them the memory of experiences 
which were their own, but belonged to the Christian world 
also. With one of the groups of the old men, Yerra- 
guntla Periah journeyed to Ongole once more. I knew 
it was the last time. I loved that old man. He had 
never in all the years failed me. They brought him 
to the platform on Sunday morning. Heavy and almost 
helpless, younger men carried him that he might sit 
once more in the accustomed place of the Ongole 
preachers. I stopped in my sermon and put him in my 
own place. As I turned to the congregation again, I 
saw a wondering look on the faces of the younger gen- 
eration, students in our schools, who knew little of the 
leaders of the old days. My heart was full. I wanted 
them all to know the love and veneration which I felt 
for this man who sat there like a child, hardly aware 
that I was speaking about him. I said : 



386 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

"Do you want to know who this is? I will tell you. 
When you get to heaven — and I hope you will all get there 
— you will see some one who looks radiant with light, far 
above you. You will almost need a telescope to see him 
distinctly, the distance between you and him will be so 
great. And you will ask some one, Who is that man 
clothed in exceeding brightness?' Then you will be told, 
*That man is Yerraguntla Periah from the Telugu country.' 
And you will strain your eyes to behold him." 

A year later his spirit took its flight. 

During those years a railroad was constructed, pass- 
ing through much of the district which was once my 
field. We thus became connected with the outside world. 
I had had something to do with this railroad. The in- 
tention of the government had not been to make a 
straight line through from Madras to Calcutta, about 
one thousand miles, but to make a detour some distance 
north of Ongole, using a branch line already in exist- 
ence, somewhat inland, thus breaking the direct con- 
nection. I addressed the Chamber of Commerce in 
Madras on the subject, and my statements were then 
taken up by the daily papers. When I was going on 
furlough in 1891, several prominent men in Madras re- 
quested me to call on Lord Cross in London, then Sec- 
retary of State for India, to call his attention to the 
desirability of a direct broad gauge line between Madras 
and Calcutta. I did so. I called on him at the India 
Office in London. Ultimately the line was made as I 
advocated. The engineers came up our way, surveying 
the country with a view to laying the railway track. 
With my letter to the Chamber of Commerce in their 
hands, they found all my observations correct. They 
had orders to give me opportunity to say where the 
railway station in Ongole should be located. This was 
a courtesy which I appreciated. 



THE feND OF LIFE 387 

While the railway was under construction, a partial 
famine broke out. A group of our preachers came 
into Ongole one day much disheartened on account of 
the scarcity. Their families were in want ; for the Chris- 
tians had not enough to eat themselves, and could not 
give anything toward the support of the preachers. I 
told them I had no money to give them, that they must 
pray to God, who sent the ravens to feed Elijah in time 
of famine, and then trust that same God to keep them 
from starving. They went away with gloomy faces and 
spent a long time in prayer together on the veranda of 
my office. Then they came smiling and happy, showing 
me a fish. A crow had come flying past and had dropped 
it among them. The supposition was that the crow had 
picked it out of a basket full of them in the fish bazaar, 
about five minutes' walk away. But even then it was 
remarkable that so small a bird as a crow should have 
carried a fish about six inches long in its beak and 
dropped it right there among the group of praying 
preachers. It encouraged them greatly. 

The sequel of it was that in 1897 the executive engi- 
neer of the railroad offered me a contract for stacking 
450,000 cubic feet of broken stone ballast along the line. 
I accepted, and later took a still larger contract of 
similar work. This meant that I once more had charge 
of a famine camp with several thousand people in it, 
while I lived in a tent close by, superintending the work. 
People came long distances to my camp, and the gov- 
ernment inquired of me what I was doing to attract so 
many to come, for relief work conducted by others was 
not always popular. 

There was a time when I had an industrial project 
much in mind. It was a question in these latter days, 
as never before, how to help our Christians to help them- 
selves. The tendency among the most intelligent of 



388 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

them was to fall into line as preachers and teachers 
in the mission. They thus remained under the super- 
vision of the mission. It was a one-sided development. 
I had in mind to establish a tannery. Our Christians 
were doing their leather work in the same crude fashion 
which had been handed down to them from their an- 
cestors. I wanted them to have a chance to learn modern 
methods, so that their work might command a sale 
beyond the borders of their own village. But nothing 
came of this plan. 

The baptisms on my field continued about the same. 
When the last division of the field was made, about 
14,000 members left the Ongole church. We kept about 
8,000, and the size of the field that remained in my 
charge was about like an ordinary county in the state 
of Iowa. Most of my best workers had gone with their 
respective fields, but I had a good staff of preachers, 
teachers and Bible women left. The baptisms were on 
an average 500 each year. This represented steady 
growth. I saw no occasion to change my methods. I 
enlarged on them by letting the Christian community 
govern itself on the lines of their village customs. I 
made much of the panchayat system — the old village 
council. At every quarterly meeting I let the people 
elect the men who were to sit in council and take up 
their requests one by one. The judgment passed by 
them was generally ratified by me. It worked well and 
was a step in the direction of self-government. Thus 
I worked in the old grooves. 

Then an accident befell me. The Podili station was 
under my supervision for a time and I had gone there 
to hold a quarterly meeting. After a hard day's work, 
I mounted my pony to go out into the open country, 
away from the people, for rest in the cool of the twi- 
light. I had heard that a wolf had been straying about 



THE END OF LIFE 389 

at dusk. This wolf now suddenly stood by the road- 
side. My pony started in terror; the saddle turned to 
the side ; I was thrown. No one had seen me fall. I got 
up and walked to the mission bungalow. Fortunately, 
I had not far to go. My collar bone and two ribs were 
broken. I gave myself only a few days for recovery 
and went to work again. A stiffness remained which 
rendered me liable to a second accident. 

This came a year later. Many baptisms had been 
taking place on my field. People from several villages 
south of Ongole had sent requests to me to come. I sent 
my camp there and expected to hold meetings and then 
baptize several hundred of those who were waiting. I 
arrived at the camp very worn and tired with the work 
that had to be done before leaving Ongole and exposure 
to the sun on the way. The cot in my tent was one 
of the tall, folding camp cots, that stand four feet from 
the ground, in order to place the sleeper above the reach 
of straying half-wild dogs, snakes and creeping things. 
I woke up in the middle of the night, and in trying to 
get off the cot, I stepped on a chair by the side of it. 
The chair slipped, and I fell heavily upon the hard 
ground. My right hip was broken. 

What followed I hardly know. As soon as I con- 
sented, my servants and the preachers who were with 
me put me on my spring wagon and took me the twenty 
miles to Ongole. There now I began a fight for life. 
I had had eight years in Ongole with no let-up since my 
last furlough, and was in a worn-out condition. Very 
likely mine was not an easy case to handle, for I was 
not accustomed to obey. I refused to lie still. I in- 
sisted that I must get up and go to work. I held out 
against the doctor's order to go to America for recovery. 
But days of pain and nights of delirium taught me to 
submit. 



390 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

The accident happened early in February, 1901. In 
April Mrs. Clough and I started on our journey to 
America. On my cot they carried me to the railway 
station in Ongole. Word had been sent to the native 
people not to come : if they loved me to stay away. Sev- 
eral thousand came nevertheless. They promised to be 
silent if I would say salaam to them. I was carried out on 
the veranda and said good-bye. Later, when on my cot 
I was carried to the railway station, many of them took 
their sandals into their hands and silently followed 
through the still starlit night. I was now going forth on 
the last ten years of my life — ten hard, crippled years. 

The friends who had gathered around us, helping us 
in every possible way, had to be left behind. My 
faithful Indian servants, too, could not go further than 
Colombo. We secured the services of a young English- 
man as attendant, and proceeded on our journey half- 
way around the world. As the hot season was now on 
us, the steamers by way of the Atlantic were crowded; 
we had to go by way of China and the Pacific Ocean. 
Upon three steamers and five launches I had to be car- 
ried, and always there were the willing hands of sailors 
to lift me, with ships' officers standing by to superintend. 
In Hong Kong six Chinamen, amid discussion of the 
unusual nature of their task, took up my stretcher and 
carried me to the hotel, where we had to wait five days 
for our next steamer. We landed in Vancouver, though 
the ship's doctor wondered whether he was going to get 
me across the Pacific alive. Then I found the sturdy 
Canadians said, "What is the matter with that old gen- 
tleman? Let us help him," and I often had ten men 
ready in a moment to lift me on or off a train. On our 
long journey across the American continent a prominent 
Baptist professor with some students came to the train. 
He said, "Well, Dr. Clough, you never did anything 



THE END OF LIFE 39 1 

for anybody, but we must lift you on this train never- 
theless." It was a revelation to me to see that I was 
never beyond the circle of human helpfulness. 

In the heart of the Canadian Rocky Mountains there 
is a beautiful place, Banff, with a good sanitarium. It 
was on our way. We stopped to break the journey, and 
then stayed four months. Here I did some deep down 
resting. I took comfort in watching the huge, snow- 
capped mountains from my window. There was no 
humbug about them. When I tried to talk of my recent 
experiences — plucked out of intense activity and reduced 
to helplessness — I was choked with tears. Why had 
this come upon me? It was while I was trying to do 
my duty. But Jesus makes no mistakes. I submitted 
in patience. 

My old friend and pastor, Dr. G. J. Johnson, who 
baptized me forty-three years before, now came to 
see me. After many years of faithful friendship, linger- 
ing not far from the other side, he felt that he must 
see his "son in the faith" before he passed away. He 
came from St. Louis, traveling three days and nights, his 
daughter accompanying him, and they stayed with us 
a month. The genial surgeon of the sanitarium re- 
marked that I was more "subdued and submissive" since 
Dr. Johnson had come, and I admitted that I felt like a 
boy alongside of the doctor. It did me good to feel that 
way. We talked much of old times, and told each 
other old-time stories. 

We stayed in America eighteen months. I visited 
my children, and saw relatives and old friends again. I 
attended the Anniversaries, but I saw that my days of 
public work were over. With some help I could walk 
a little, but I remained helpless to a large degree. Our 
secretaries and the Executive Committee were very con- 
siderate and generous to me, and when I now asked to 



392 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

be sent back to my old place in India, they told me I 
should be cared for, whether I did any more work or 
not, whether I remained in America or went back to 
Ongole. My heart was in India ; I wanted my old work 
again. We sailed in October, 1902. 

On arrival in Ongole I was met by the same great 
crowd of people that always met me after a furlough. 
They were glad I was back in the old bungalow. For two 
and a half years I held out, in the old grooves, carried 
along by the impetus of the past. It was hard work. 
I could not keep it up. My strength was failing. We 
had to seek a cooler climate in one of the hill stations not 
far away. Sickness nigh unto death showed me that 
even a portion of my former work was henceforth out 
of the question. I retired from active service in 1905. 

Life away from Ongole was hard to bear. I longed 
for the accustomed surroundings. But I had to wait; 
for at just about the time when I was beginning to break 
down, it looked as though my old bungalow also would 
fall into ruin. The old house and I had seen great 
days together, and now it looked as if we were tumbling 
down together. It was rebuilt, and then we went to live 
in it again. I soon found that my being there could 
not bring back the past. In my thoughts I had been 
living in the old days, when my compound was the center 
of activities reaching over portions of several districts, 
and thousands of Telugu people were glad when they 
knew I was at my post. But these days were gone. 
Even before the hot season was on us, I was ready and 
glad to go to Coonoor on the Nilgiri Hills, where it 
would be cool and quiet. 

Then the question came up about the story of my 
life, for which Mrs. Clough and I had been collecting 
the material. If this was to be written while I was 
still there to help, it could not be put off much longer. 



THE END OF LIFE 393 

I had often been asked to write this story, but while I 
was still in the work I was too busy. After my retire- 
ment it was too late — I could not write any more. We 
all looked to Mrs. Clough to do it. She wrote several 
chapters and then she came to me and told me the 
difficulties were too great, that I must release her from 
the task. This I could not do. I wanted her to write 
the book. Finally she said, "There is only one way 
in which it can be written: you must tell your story 
yourself. In that case I am willing to do the work 
for you." I hesitated; for I feared that in such joint 
authorship I might no longer be equal to my part. But 
I saw that she believed it could be done. I asked her 
to go ahead and I would do all in my power to help her.^ 

I soon saw that this worked well. It often encouraged 
me to find that where it was a question of the deeper mo- 
tives of my work, I could answer for myself better than 
I could have done when still in my prime. That strange 
thread of happenings that ran through my life with an 
overruling destiny, seemed clearer than ever before. Dur- 
ing my years of retirement I had not been idle: I had 
kept up a steady thinking, and my life had become far re- 
moved from me. I saw my failures, and saw the places 
where my expectations did not come to pass. As we 
talked it all over, I realized that we were setting forth as- 
pects of this story which had never been brought out be- 
fore. I saw that it was going to be just such a book as I 
had had in mind. 

It was a strange experience to me thus to come face 
to face with my past. I had never before realized to 
how great a degree I was led in ways which were not 
of my choosing. In the earlier portions of the story I 
sometimes felt almost as if a sort of violence had been 
done me : my own schemes were always thwarted, I was 
always going where I did not want to go. At times 



394 SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

I felt dazed, and had to readjust myself, and tell myself 
that Jesus makes no mistakes. But, as I thought of 
the Telugu Mission, as I was leaving it, with its loo 
missionaries, 60,000 members and 200,000 adherents, 
and all its schools — it is the very mission which I wanted 
when I first went to India. God had fulfilled my hopes. 

When this book was so far finished that I saw the 
rest could be done without me, I realized that the next 
step for me to take was to leave India. Mrs. Clough 
had been under doctor's orders for the past two years 
to go home to America, . but she had steadily refused 
to go and leave me behind; nor had I any wish to be 
left behind. I could not allow her to run further risk. I 
said : ''I am going. Engage passage as soon as possible." 

This meant that I could not die in India, and I could 
not have my grave in Ongole. I had the place selected 
in our cemetery there. But I had of late been told re- 
peatedly that almost any other place, even the ocean, 
would be a better place for my grave. I would not 
believe this. They said the native Christians, and others 
also, over all that seven thousand square miles which was 
my tramping ground in the old days, were not even 
waiting till I was dead; they had already begun to use 
my name in the various rites and incantations which are 
so prevalent in India. It was said that when they were 
digging a well, and did not strike water, the village 
elders boiled rice near the well, each took a handful, and 
holding it over the well, thinking of me, they together 
spoke my name, dropped the rice, and it was said ''the 
water came immediately." Thus they had already begun 
to do when plowing their fields, when tending their 
cattle, and in more ways than was known. I can only 
say, I am sorry they are doing that way. I always 
taught them not to do such things and they are thus 
setting aside my teaching. I know my hands were open 



THE END OF LIFE 395 

to help them. They seem to be trying thus to make 
me help them still. 

But I had held to it, that no one would interfere with 
my grave. Then they told me that an old missionary 
south of us, who had really loved the people as I had 
done, died and was buried among them. His grave was 
kept covered with marks of worship, and signs that 
prayers for help had been offered. His friends built a 
high wall around it, and then the worship was conducted 
outside the wall. They told me also of a missionary 
north of us, whose remains had to be removed to some 
silent, peaceful spot, of which only a few knew. Think- 
ing this over in all its bearings, I had already begun to 
keep still about that grave in Ongole. If it stood for 
something in my life, which, like many another intention 
and expectation of mine, belonged to that which "was 
not to be," then the sooner I let it go the better. 

Very reluctantly I set my face toward sailing for 
America. My work in India is done. Soon I shall meet 
my Master, Jesus, face to face, to whom I led so many 
thousands of the poor and ignorant and despised. When 
that time comes, may it be my joy to find in the light of 
his countenance the assurance that the purpose is fulfilled 
for which I was brought into life. 



We undertook that voyage with the greatest hesitation. 
Neither my husband nor I wanted to go, yet the doors 
opened before us, and there was nothing to do but walk 
through them. Loving interest was shown us in leaving 
India, and help in abundance was awaiting us when we 
landed in Boston. We settled in Rochester, New York, 
which is only forty miles away from the place of his 
birth. 

The months passed. He seemed at least to hold his 



39^ SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY IN THE ORIENT 

own, and spoke sometimes of returning to India. But 
a change came. He realized that the end was near. At 
twilight one evening, he said, "I am thinking of the will 
of God." He saw that he was understood. Long ago 
he said that when he came to die there would be no good- 
bye and no farewell message: '*I am going to die and 
say nothing about it." He carried this out. 

A friend of former years came and offered Christian 
consolation. He appreciated the sympathy that breathed 
through the prayer, but the friend said afterwards, "Like 
some great oriental he meant to go and meet his God in 
his own way. He wanted the prayer of no man." 

Early the last morning of his conscious life he spoke 
in a few brief sentences of the past, intimating that he 
had scanned his life, and pronounced judgment on him- 
self. He wanted no reply : he only wanted to be under- 
stood. 

His spirit held him to the last in the calm faith and 
childlike trust that always marked him. He died un- 
afraid. Very weary he was, but his eyes were calm and 
fearless till they closed, as if to go to sleep, and he 
sank into long unconsciousness. In an atmosphere of 
great peace, a serene look coming over his face, he 
breathed his life away, still unconscious, when the sun 
was rising on the morning of Thanksgiving Day, Novem- 
ber 24, 19 10. 

Since the grave in Ongole was not to be, it was his 
wish to be buried in Newton Center, a suburb of Boston. 
In its beautiful cemetery the society which he served had 
bought ground to bury its dead. Here now he was 
gathered unto his fathers in a spiritual sense. In this 
cemetery, long before. Dr. Warren was laid to rest, — his 
chief, the man of whom he used to say that a father 
could not have been more to his own son than he was 
to him. Here was Dr. Jewett's resting-place, with whom 



THE END OF LIFE 39/ 

he was sent forty-six years before "to give him Christian 
burial in a heathen land." The order was reversed. He 
had now come to receive Christian burial close to Dr. 
Jewett. And here, only a narrow path between them, 
was the grave of Dr. S. F. Smith, whose song, "Shine 
on, Lone Star," had contained a prophecy, which the 
body now laid to rest had worked strenuously to fulfill. 
Both in Rochester and in Newton Center there were 
services in which men participated who were bound to 
him by ties of fellowship in work. A cable message 
took the tidings to India. Once more religious and 
secular papers rehearsed the story of the work with which 
his life was knit together. There is peace where his body 
lies, peace unbroken by incantations aiming at material 
benefits. There is joy where his spirit went, and the 
continuation of this story may now be proceeding in the 
language of the heaven world. Inscribed over his grave 
is his favorite verse : 

"Be still and know that I am God." 



GLOSSARY 

Brahmans, The — The aristocracy of learning in India, of Indo- 
Aryan descent. 

Dhora — A white man; equivalent for Mister. 

Guru — A religious teacher. 

JuTTU — The sacred top-knot of hair on a man's head. 

Karnam — The village accountant, generally a Brahman. 

Madigas, The — The leather workers of the Telugu country, of 
tribal origin, forming more than one-half of the Pariah popu- 
lation. 

Mantra — A prayer, holy verse, or mystic word. 

MuNSiFF — The headman of the ancient Dravidian village organiza- 
tion. 

Panchama — Fifth caste — the recently created caste name of the 
Pariahs. 

Panchayat — The council of five village elders. 

Pariahs, The — The submerged portion of the Hindu community, 
outside the caste system, held in menial service. 

Rupee — A silver coin worth about thirty cents. 

Salaam — Peace — an oriental gesture of salutation. 

SuDRAs, The — Landowners and artisans, of Dravidian race, forming 
the bulk of South Indian population. 

Tahsildar — A subjudge for criminal cases. 

Taluk — A county, about 30 miles square. 

Telugus, The — A South Indian people, about 20,000,000 in number, 
living in the northern part of the Madras Presidency. 

Yetti — A Madiga who carries loads for the village. 

Yoga — The experimental union of the individual with the divine. 
There are four paths of Yoga, of which Raja Yoga is one. It 
is the psychological way to union through the practice of con- 
centration. 

Yogi, The — One who practices Yoga. 



399 



SUBJECT INDEX 



An Eastern People 
The Brahmans 

— The Aryan origin of, 127, 168, 198 

— upholding the caste system, 83, 120, 124-5, 128, 321-2 

— showing exclusiveness in education, 119-20, 122, 331, 375 

— when intolerant in religion, 84, 152, 157, 168, 171, 198 

— Attitude of, toward the outcaste population, 84, 112, 126, 

152, 157, 168, 174, 321-2 
— Power of, in opposing Christianity, 84, no, 122, 152, 157, 

170, 173, 186, 198, 212, 321 

The Sudras 

— The Dravidian origin of, 127, 162, 168, 174, 191 

— as the farmers of the community, 127, 162, 238, 258 

— as the employers of the Madigas, 127, 161, 166, 168, 178, 

323, 345, 352 
— and the Christianization of the Madigas, 163, 168, 174, 

178, 321 
— themselves holding aloof from Christianity, 165, 267, 321, 

354 
The Madigas 

— The tribal origin and characteristics of, 84, 127, 191, 225, 

282 
—The poverty of, 114, 139, 164-5, 238, 264, 352-4 
— performing menial service, 128, 164 
— degraded by carrion eating, 126, 163-6, 283, 318 
— as outcastes in the community, 84, 87, 113, 117, 126, 128, 

164, 241, 321 
—oppressed by the village cooperative system, 161, 163, 

168, 171 
—fearing and appeasing their village gods, 93, 139, 148, 167, 

248, 265, 319 
— responding to the Christian appeal, 103, 128, 137, 144, 147, 

161, 290, 299 
— seeking social betterment by education, 117, 191, 322, 

352-3, 376 
— uniting in a social revolution, 154, 156, 159, 161, 168, 176, 

184, 322 
—The primitive self-administration of, Christianized, 191-3, 

195, 241, 247, 263, 275, 343-5 
— forming a Christian community, 102, 156, 184, 290, 316, 

335, 343, 371, 394 

401 



402 SUBJECT INDEX 

A Western People 

American Activities 

— in forming contacts with Asiatics, 73, iii, 187, 201-8, 365, 

373 
— in giving money for Christianization, 117, 217, 350, 353, 

375 
— in applying democratic principles, iii, 118, 132, 159, 169, 

176, 214, 269, 321 
— in adapting Western forms of Christianity to the East, 

186-8, 194-5, 213-4, 329, 332, 341, 380 
— in modifying methods of evangelization, 77, 79, 188, 193, 

195, 329, 345, 380, 384 
— in adjusting Western ideas to the East, iii, 159-2, 177, 

185, 202, 239, 322, 332, 343 ^ 
— and national traits affecting missions, 296, 372 
— ^and Americans compared with Asiatics, 73, 126, 165, 169, 

198 

British Rule 

— Democratic spirit of, 157, 169, 177, 241, 249 

— Liberal educational policy in, 118, 123 

— Religious toleration under, 84, 119, 168, 174, 323-4 

— Legal equality granted by, 108, 169, 171 

— Social amelioration of the outcaste in, 108, 128, 169 

— a disintegrating force in the Indian village, 112, 160 

The Missionary Enterprise 

The Denomination 

— recognizing its obligation, 200, 222, 225, 368, 375 
— receiving the converts into fellowship, 213-5, 273, 308 
— sustaining a mass movement, 134, 271, 295, 301-2 
—guarding its tenets, 214, 297, 299, 306-8, 335, 341, 379 
— roused to action, 298, 304, 369-70, 372-6 

The Home Churches 

— and the non-Christian world, 73, 293, 308, 366 

— Contacts with missions formed by, 219, 294, 298, 347, 350, 

365 
— Pastors of, and their missionary policy, 219-20, 292, 294, 

368-9 
— Business men in, and their capacity applied, 301-2, 366 
— Responsibility for reenforcement carried by, 200, 223, 295, 

298, 368 
— Definite response from, 217-9, 298 



SUBJECT INDEX 403 

The Missionary Society 

— officers of, as trustees of the denomination, 214, 292, 297-8 
— in cooperation with the home churches, 200, 216, 294, 298, 

372 
— ^and its policy of self-support on the foreign field, 350, 

353-5 
— and the problem of education, 116, 122, 330-1, 376 
— Attitude of, toward church organization, 214, 341, 379-81, 

384 
— and sending out missionaries, 201, 218, 295, 348, 374 
— and occupying new ground, 64, 89, 225-31, 234-6, 378 
— and adjustment to oriental conditions, 297, 354, 366 
— upholding events on the foreign field, 214, 291, 296-9 
— meeting demands for a larger policy, 116, 366, 369-70, 375 
— in relation with other societies, 62, 86, 97, 235-6, 305-6, 

327, 350, 356, 366-7, 374 
Missionary Policy 

— toward class distinction, 84, 113, 122, 132, 169, 199, 321-2, 

331, 375 
— in educating orientals, 116, 122, 330-1, 375-6 
— in occupying strategic centers, 61, 88-9, 225-6, 229-30, 

234-6, 327, 378 
— toward native agency, 121, 187, 190, 332 
— toward mass movements, 214-5, 263, 267, 297, 305-8 
— in forming methods, 106, 188, 193, 202, 328, 331, 346, 354-6 
— in following the policy of the State, 87, 349 
— in requiring statesmanship from leading men, 236, 292, 376 
— in relationships between religious organizations, 62, 86, 

97, 235-6, 273-4, 301, 305-8, 366-7 
— calling forth definite acts of faith in God, loi, 115, 132, 
213, 230, 272, 281, 286, 307, 328 

The Student Volunteer Movement 
— The beginning of, 367 

— an interdenominational recruiting agency, 367 
— backed by enthusiasm in the churches, 368 
— found ready to meet definite demands, 218, 373 

Bible Passages 

—in tract form, 77-8, 88, 267 

— voicing command, 133-5 

— in missionary experience, 45, 206, 208, 248, 279, 310 

A Belief in the Doctrine of Election 

— in individual experience, 58, 129, 176 
— as a basis for the missionary enterprise, 81, 86, 132, 206, 
321 



404 SUBJECT INDEX 

The Principle of the Brotherhood of Man 
— applied in times of famine, 239, 249 
— when facing the degradation of the outcaste, 126, 241, 249 
— Eastern and Western ideas of, compared, 239, 249, 262 
— ^Interracial application of, 254, 256, 299 

Prophetic Vision 

— when the "Lone Star" poem was written, 65, 300 

— An audience swayed by, 66, 300, 368, 372 

— A mission saved through, 63, 66, 222, 300, 372 

— on "Prayer Meeting Hill," 70, 85, 90, 129, 300, 309, 384 

— in expecting a multitude, 81, 82, 103, 107, 135, 137, 230, 235, 

271-2, 290 
— in staking boundary lines, 61, 67, 89, 230 
— concerning the call of men to service, 69, 103-4 
— in applying New Testament methods, 80, 214, 308, 341 
— ^in working for the redemption of a community, 128, 135, 

209, 290, 331, 385 

The Hindu Religion 

The Polytheism of Village Worship 

— a mixture of Aryan and non-Aryan cults, 93, 150, 168 
— Demonology given a large part in, 151, 155, 167, 205, 225, 

248, 265 
— Mother-worship prominent in, 93, 148, 150, 170, 322 
— largely actuated by fear, intended to appease, 155, 167, 

205, 248, 265 
— forming part of the cooperative system, 152, 167-8 
— The Madiga part in, a duty to the community, 15 1-2, 160, 

167, 170, 265 
— Consequences of disengaging from, 15 1-4, 161, 170-2, 266, 

323 
— The idols as emblems of, given up, yy, 168, 182, 266, 288, 

319 
The Teachers of Raja Yoga 

— as part of a hierarchy with power of initiation, 93-4, 100 
— of pure type seldom available to the outcaste, 95, 104 
— giving out truths similar to Christian teaching, 93-5, 140-2, 

145, 160 
— forming a transition to the Christian preacher, 94, 100, 

106, 142-3, 188, 194, 197, 360 

Hindu Religious Reform Movements 
— The nature of, 93-4, 140 
— gathering around the personality of a Yogi, 94, 140-2, 224 



SUBJECT INDEX 405 

Hindu Religious Reform Movements — Continued 

— based on training in Yoga, 94, 141 

— guarding the inner teaching by initiations, 94, 140-1, 197 

— of social significance by opposing caste and idolatry, 94, 

140- 1 
— ^training the men who became Christian leaders, 94, 100, 

106, 145, 188, 194, 197, 285, 360 
— preparing the way for the Christian movement, 101, 141 -2, 

146, 224 

The Christian Religion 
Conversion 

—The nature of, 137, 139, 275, 283 

— Outward evidence of, 87, 138-9, 282-3, 310 

— and Christian teaching, 88, 146, 154, 157, 283, 350 

— Definite instances of, 76, 83, 87, 98, 142-3, 178-82 

— when there is a mass movement, 147, 158, 215, 224, 249, 

264, 276, 283, 299, 306 
— as cause of contest in the family, 83, 97, 129, 147-9, 177-8, 

181-3 
— and persecution in the village, 77, 108, 152-4, 170, 323 
— calling for readjustment in communal life, 156, 159, 160, 

177, 319 
— as an abiding faith in Jesus Christ, 35, 283, 317, 381 

Baptism 

— regarded as defilement by the Hindus, 83, 130, 323 

— preceded by conversion and Christian teaching, 102, 157, 

276, 283 
—The people begging for, 158, 263, 268, 279, 287, 319 
— Motive in asking for, 264, 267, 278, 290, 363 
— Reason for not granting, 263, 267, 283 
— of hundreds, 136, 158, 214, 284, 289, 359, 362 
— of thousands, 267, 276, 286, 289, 296, 301, 319, 363 

Oriental Churches 

— when of natural growth, 189, 332 

— beginning as Christian centers, 99, loi, 114, 185, 191, 233, 

— built upon village organization, 189-90, 319, 341, 355, 379 
— utilizing the office of elders and panchayat, 191-3, 319, 

343-6, 388 
— as churches in the New Testament sense, loi, 195, 206, 

214, 335, 341, 380 



''406 SUBJECT INDEX 

The Christian Preacher 

— adapting his methods to communal life, 144-S, 147, 189 

— retaining traits of the Hindu Guru, 100, 105-6, 188, 194 

— Christian training required by, 115, 186-7, 200 

— Ordination of, to the ministry, 194, 332-4 

— Relation of, to the missionary, 92, 98, 187-8, 207, 210-3, 

223, 279, 285, 339, 361, 379, 383 
— as spokesman of the people, 92, 241, 276, 280, 287, 345 
— affected by village organization, 195, 281, 345 
— helping to evolve missionary methods, 92, 106, 280, 379 
— learning Western church organization, 186, 193-5, 334, 34i 
— obtaining support from the members, 106, 238, 261, 335, 

355 
— and his attitude toward baptism, 99, 212, 268, 276, 280, 284, 

287, 362 
— as part of a continuity of management, 90, 195-7, 224, 247, 

ZZ2, 360, 379, 385 

The Contact Between Two Religions 

Missionary Methods 

— the spiritual motive for, 80, 209 

— compared, 74, 78, 80, 203, 326 

— in efforts at temple festivals, 78 

— in bazaar preaching, 75, yy, no, 198 

— in direct village evangelization, 102, 108, 224, 316-20, 343-6 

— in training and sustaining native agency, 113, 185-8, 196, 

227, 332-4 
— in educating Christians and non-Christians, 117, 122, 330-1, 

375-6 
— in church organization, loi, 193-5, 213, 233, 332-5, 341, 346, 

379-81 
— in mass movements, 136, 160, 185, 215, 224, 282-3, 286, 305-8 
— in seeking financial solution by self-support, 106, 108, 238, 

261, 352-7 
— in mingling the spiritual and temporal, 248, 269, 301, 317, 

340, 345, 351-3 
— in recognizing the institutions of village life, 189, 192, 204, 

225, 275, 282, 316, 343-6, 355 
— dictated by circumstances, lOi, 132, 144, 230, 246, 268, 287, 

307, 328, 346, 356, 380 
— adapted to oriental conditions, 146, 187-8, 192, 195, 201-6, 

275, 282, 308, 316, 343-6, 355, 380 
— when West and East clash, 120, 155, 160, 172, 198, 322 
— when denominational tenets break down, 193, 206-7, 27^, 

297, 306-8, 329, 335, 341, 346, 380 



SUBJECT INDEX 407 

Opposition to Christianity 

— because the vengeance of the village gods is feared, 107, 
149, 170 

— because it affects the solidarity of the family, 97, 129, 166, 
177-8, 183 

— ^because its principles break down the village system, 160, 
169 

— ^because the village officials are forced to make adjust- 
ments, 152, 168, 320 

— ^by threats, false rumors and arguments, 129, 178, 198 

—by stoning, beating and imprisonment, no, 152-4, 179, 198 

— ^by boycotting through the cooperative system, 162, 171, 
173, 322-S 

— ^by coercive attempts to uphold the old worship, 84, 108, 
152, 170, 323 

— found to be of remarkable tenacity, in, 198, 267, 321 

A Christian Mass Movement 

— The principles of, 80, 160, 215, 290 

— going on lines of family cohesion, 145, 189, 224, 247, 282, 

290, 319 
— ^aided by tribal spirit, 99, 123, 136, 145, 224, 282, 290, 306, 

320-1 
— affected by village organization, 168, 189, 191-3, 204, 263, 

275, 282, 319, 343-6 
— given the character of a social uprising, 160, 168, 192, 225, 

299, 318 
— ^absorbing strength from preceding Hindu movements, 94, 

96, loi, 141-2, 145, 197, 224 
— Distinct religious experience evident in, 93, 104, 142-3, 

225, 249, 264 
— going beyond lines of denominational policy, 214-5, 297, 

305-8, 329, 342, 346 
— due to New Testament methods, 80, 134, 215, 308, 335, 380 
— not essentially affected by Western organization, 185, 

193-5, 336, 341, 346, 355, 379-81 
— depending on a continuity of leadership, 96, 186, 195-7, 

247, 285, 327, 332, 360, 379, 383, 385 
— growing through faith in the spiritual presence of Jesus, 

107, 137, 156, 163, 186, 208, 215, 248, 274, 286, 290 

The Result 
Education 

— in village schools, 114, 191, 276, 318, 330 

— in station schools, 118, 330 

— in high schools and colleges, 121, 330-1, 375-6 



408 SUBJECT INDEX 

Education — Continued 

— Problem of, for non-Christians, 122, 330-1, 375-6 

— in training native agency, 114, 186-9, 194-5, 207, 227, 360 

— in relation to self-support, 350-4 

— Social betterment effected by, 117, 191, 302, 318, 352-3, 

375-6 
— demanded by the converts, 191, 297, 318, 353, 361 
— Attitude of the Home Base toward, 116, 214, 217, 219, 296, 

331, 353, 375-6 
The Status of the Women 

— when standing with the men in the new life, 107, 114, 156, 

181, 191, 227 
— when opposed to Christianity, 166, 177-8, 183 
— giving up their sons to become preachers, 104, 114, 179 
— seeking an education with the men, 114, 191 
— keeping step with social betterment, 166, 191 
— giving their services to the mission, 107-8, 179, 190-1, 225 
— suffering persecution for Jesus' sake, 179 

Church Organisation 

— an unsolved problem, 193, 341, 346, 379-81 

— as viewed by the home churches, 213, 379 

— made secondary in missionary efforts, 213, 346, 380 

— whether adapted to Eastern communities, 186-7, I93-S, 

335, 344-6, 379 
— Attempts at, partially successful, 193, 335, 341, 346, 380 
— and self-support on communal lines, 106, 238, 261, 336, 355 
— Definite instances of, 102, 193, 233, 332, 334-5 

Social Betterment 

— a legitimate aim in missionary endeavor, 128, 262, 301, 350, 

353-4, 375, 380 
— through education received in the Mission, 117, 191, 297, 

302, 318, 352-4, 361, 376 
— ^by withdrawal from low forms of worship, 150, 168, 171, 

319 
— ^by demanding a new basis for cooperative labor, 152, 

161-3, 166-8 
— ^by a united stand against village oppression, 154, 164, 172, 

325 
— ^by obtaining proof of equality in legal status, 108, 171 
— by raising the social status, 117, 128, 166, 191, 249, 318 
— by relief when sick, starving or oppressed, 243, 249, 350 
— by Christianizing the communal life, 79, 99, 186, 190, 204-5, 

299, 317 
— ^by finding in devotion to Jesus a new motive, 156, 249, 
262, 284, 317, 353-4, 357 



SUBJECT INDEX 409 

New Testament Times Repeated 

— by sending forth men to convert the Gentiles, 222 

— by letting the "common people" come, 113, 134, 166, 169, 

199, 290 
— by establishing Christian centers, loi, 189, 233, 335, 341, 

346, 380 
— by receiving definite command, 133-5 
— by conflict between the old order and the new, 144, 154, 

169, 299, 322 
— ^by suffering for Jesus' sake, 108, 144, 152-4, 156-7, 172, 

179, 184, 265-6, 325 
— ^by Pentecostal baptism, 82, 102, 280, 284-6, 301, 363 



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which the ordinary student has had access." — Religious Tele- 
scope. 

Western Women in Eastern Lands 

By HELEN BARRETT MONTGOMERY 

Author of " The Island World of the Pacific " 



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Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York 



BY WALTER RAUSCHENBUSCH 



Christianity and the Social Crisis 

8vo, 4J0 pages, cloth, gilt top, $1.50 net 

This book is a discussion of the position the church must as- 
sume in the face of the approaching social crisis. The first 
chapters are historical, and set forth the religious development 
of the prophets of Israel, the life and teachings of Jesus, and the 
dominant tendencies of primitive Christianity, in order to ascer- 
tain what was the original and fundamental purpose of the great 
Christian movement in history. Out of this historical survey 
grows the conclusion that the essential purpose of Christianity 
was to transform human society into the kingdom of God by re- 
generating and reconstituting all human relations. Successive 
chapters deal with the reasons why the Christian church has 
never undertaken to carry out this fundamental purpose of its 
existence; the conditions which constitute the present social 
crisis; the vital interest of the church in the social movement; 
and the contributions which Christianity can make, and the di- 
rections in which the religious spirit should exert its force. In 
his account of social conditions and tendencies, the author has 
drawn on his experience of eleven years as a pastor among the 
working people of New York City. 

"It is of the sort to make its readers feel that the book was 
bravely written to free an honest man's heart; that conscientious 
scholarship and hard thinking have wrought it out and enriched 
it; that it is written in a clear, incisive style; that stern passion 
and gentle sentiment stir at times among the words, and keen 
wit and grim humor flash here and there in the turn of a sentence. 
It is a book to like, to learn from, and, though the theme be sad 
and serious, to be charmed with." — N. Y. Times, 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York 



IMPORTANT BOOKS ON RELIGION 



Rauschenbusch 

Christianizing the Social Order 

By Dr. WALTER RAUSCHENBUSCH 

(Rochester Theological Seminary), Author of "Christianity and the 

Social Crisis " 

A study of present-day problems written with even greater insight 
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$1.50 net 
Leuba 

A Psychological Study of Religion 

Its Origin, Function, and Future 
By JAMES H. LEUBA, Ph.D. (Bryn Mawr) 

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of ancient ideals." 

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Gilbert 



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lesus 

By GEORGE HOLLEY GILBERT, Ph.D., D.D. 

(Chicago Theological Seminary) 

"One of the ablest and manliest discussions of the historical 
Jesus and the legendary Jesus. A sane and lovable appreciation." 

$1.50 net 
Nearing 

Social Religion 

By SCOTT NEARING, Ph.D. 

(University of Pennsylvania) , Author of " Social Adjustment," " Women 

and Social Progress," etc. 

The most deplorable elements in the modern social and indus- 
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$1.00 net 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New Tork 



IMPORTANT NEW MACMILLAN BOOKS ON 
CHRISTIANITY AND RELIGION 



By Dr. Hillis 

The Story of Phaedrus 

How We got the Greatest Book in the World 
By Dr. NEWELL DWIGHT HILLIS 
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The Reformation in Germany 

By HENRY C. VEDDER 
Professor of Church History in Crozer Theological Seminary 
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The Prophets of Israel 

By MOSES BUTTENWIESER, Ph.D. 

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